


Homelander's sexy dragon friend (A bizarre love triangle)

by MissingTime



Series: The Age Of Quarrel [2]
Category: The Boys (TV 2019)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Bestiality, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-26
Updated: 2021-01-26
Packaged: 2021-03-08 17:09:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 78,713
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27210238
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissingTime/pseuds/MissingTime
Summary: Homelander is asked by Vought to take care of a newly discovered creature, a dragon, in order to increase his popularity among children and, more importantly, allow Vought to make money selling dragon merchandise.However, as the bond between Homelander and the dragon grows, so does the jealousy of Black Noir, an animal lover who becomes romantically interested in the dragon as Homelander begins to lust for him, leading to a situation that both Vought, and Billy Butcher, are unable to handle.
Series: The Age Of Quarrel [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1979029
Comments: 2
Kudos: 13





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I might have schizophrenia, or some kind of psychosis.
> 
> What bugs me is that I really don't think that doctors are capable of helping me at all. They've let me down too many times in one form or another, to the point where I don't even have a health card anymore because I just don't have faith in doctors anymore.

“Would you like to have a pet?” Madelyn had called the most famous and powerful superhero into her office just so that she could ask him if he wanted to have a pet. That was such a strange thing, especially considering that Homelander had repeatedly told her that he didn’t want to have a dog. He thought that most animals were disgusting.

“I’m not going to adopt a puppy,” Homelander stated. “I don’t like dogs,” Madelyn nodded her head and smiled sweetly at him.

“Well, that’s a good thing because the pet we’ve found for you isn’t a dog,” Homelander growled when he heard what Madelyn had said. As much as he hated dogs, he certainly didn’t plan on taking care of a cat. Women had cats, men had dogs, superheroes had supercats and superdogs, which didn’t exist.

“I’m just going to get to the point. We found a dragon, and he’s eager to meet you. He thinks that you’re a real hero, and he wants to meet you. We think that it would be in everyone’s best interest if you two became friends,” Homelander smirked at Madelyn as she explained the situation.

“I am a hero,” Homelander stated. “And I am not fucking thirteen. I don’t need or want a pet dragon to be my friend. Black Noir likes animals, why don’t you talk to him about it?” Madelyn shook her head.

“Believe me, as soon as Black Noir heard about the dragon he begged us to let him keep it as a pet. However, Stan Edgar believes that having a pet dragon would be far better for your image right now,” Homelander’s cold stare could have sent chills down the spine of even the person with the coldest of souls.

“If you don’t get along with this dragon, then Black Noir is more than willing to take care of him for you in the privacy of his own home, away from the press. However, Stan Edgar believes that the public needs to see you with a pet. If you won’t get a dog, then a dragon will do just fine,” the sweet smile on Madelyn’s voice made Homelander want to vomit.

“Just imagine how the public will react to seeing you with a real dragon, flying through the sky, saving the world. The kids will absolutely love it, and Vought will make a fortune with the toy sales,” Homelander was interested in appealing to kids, but in his mind, he was already cool enough to appeal to kids. He didn’t need a dragon, and he truly believed that the dragon would be better off partnering with Black Noir.

“Look, Madelyn. A dragon isn’t my brand. My brand is America, and a dragon just isn’t America,” Madelyn shook her head.

“I agree with you. We have thousands of supes in the world, but as far as we know, this is the only dragon. The fact that Stan Edgar wants you to take care of it, rather than allow us to study it, is baffling,” Madelyn sighed and Homelander’s eyebrow raised. He didn’t like the idea of keeping a dragon as a pet, but having exclusive access to the only dragon in the world was intriguing.

He wouldn’t want the dragon to be treated like he had been. Alone in a room, monitored by scientists 24/7, without love, trained to be a weapon. It made him into the man he was, an emotionally unstable, incredibly empty man who had all the love, money, and power in the world, but still felt like he needed more.

“Where is the dragon, Madelyn?”

\---

Black Noir was overjoyed when he learned that Stan Edgar had found an actual dragon in the city of Vancouver. Luckily, not too many people had seen it before Vought had claimed it as their own. The ones that had seen it were more than willing to keep it a secret when offered a very generous financial incentive, aside from one person who Black Noir had been tasked with eliminating.

He performed that task very quickly so that he could return to the tower to spend time with the dragon before he was given to Homelander. It wasn’t fair that Homelander got all the good things when he was the one doing most of the work behind the scenes. If anyone deserved to keep the dragon as a pet, to love him and care for him, it was Black Noir, not Homelander.

However, Black Noir was a good soldier who always followed orders even when he disagreed with them. He also suspected that Homelander would refuse to take care of the dragon, or better yet, the dragon would prefer Black Noir’s company over Homelander’s company, and he would choose him as his caretaker instead. Wouldn’t that be amazing? Black Noir finally getting his happy ending instead of watching other people get everything they wanted?

The purple-scaled dragon was on the floor in front of him happily eating from the bowl of salad that Black Noir had prepared for him. He had initially offered him steak, but the dragon claimed that he was a vegetarian and would never even think about eating an animal.

A talking vegetarian dragon who cared about the well-being of animals. That was the pet that Black Noir dreamed of having ever since he was a little kid, and he wasn’t allowed to have him as a pet.

“Can you talk?” Black Noir shook his head. “That’s a shame. I want to thank you properly for being so nice to me, but I can’t do that if I don’t know your name,” the dragon paused for a moment to smile at the silent ninja.

“Thank you, kind stranger. I hope that everyone here is as nice as you,” Black Noir held his hand to his heart, touched by the gratitude that the dragon had shown him.

It was at that moment that he knew that he couldn’t allow Homelander to have his way with the dragon. If Homelander killed, or hurt, or was even a little bit cruel to the dragon, Black Noir’s heart would break.

Shortly after the black ninja had that realization, the door opened, and Homelander walked into the room with Madelyn Stillwell following closely behind him. The eyes of the dragon lit up when he watched Homelander walk into the room, and Black Noir couldn’t help himself from feeling a little bit jealous.

“Black Noir, I see you’ve been taking care of our new friend. Excellent work, as always,” the ninja stoically nodded his head. Outright telling Homelander to be nice to the dragon would be suicide, even for him. However, he would still be able to monitor the dragon in his free time. Maybe Homelander would even let him petsit if he stayed on his good side.

“Black Noir, is that your name?” The ninja nodded his head and the dragon smiled warmly at him.

“Thank you for the delicious meal, Black Noir,” the ninja pointed finger guns at the dragon as a way of showing his appreciation, and as an attempt at looking cool. America was Homelander’s brand, looking cool was his.

“Well this is just wonderful. He speaks, he’s polite, and I can tell by those muscles that he’s strong. He’s a perfect American,” no one in the room wanted to tell Homelander that the dragon had been found in Canada, not America. Stan Edgar had already arranged for the dragon to be granted American citizenship when he was revealed to the world, so the fact that he was technically Canadian didn’t matter too much. At least, that was what everyone hoped.

“Well, I’m very pleased to meet you, and to welcome you to our family. If you’re lucky, maybe one day you might join The Seven like me and Black Noir. Wouldn’t that be wonderful?” The dragon smiled widely when he heard Homelander’s offer, but his smile faded fairly quickly.

“That’s, umm, nice. But, I have my own family. A mother, a father, a son, a wife, and my friends. I like it here, but I know that I have to leave at some point,” Homelander’s smile wavered a little. Black Noir was both pleased to learn about the dragon’s family, and disappointed to know that the dragon wanted to leave him to return to them.

“Well, family is very important, I won’t deny that. If you don’t want to stay, we can’t make you,” the dragon shook his head.

“I am stuck here for the time being, I guess. I don’t think that I’ll be returning home anytime soon,” the dragon sadly stated. “I was hoping that you could help me return home, if that’s possible. I don’t know why I’m here, all that I know is that I fell asleep and when I woke up I was here.”

Black Noir felt sympathy towards the dragon. He knew the feeling of being somewhere that he felt he didn’t belong, so he understood what the dragon must have been feeling. Homelander probably also felt some sympathy towards the dragon, but not in the same way as the ninja.

Black Noir worked for Stan Edgar doing things that even Homelander could never understand because he was loyal. He never disobeyed orders, and he kept every single secret that he was aware of safe. He was a good soldier, perhaps the best soldier, and the last thing that he wanted was for the dragon to become like him or Homelander, a pawn used by Vought.

He wanted to help the dragon return home. He knew that Stan Edgar trusted him, and he was sure that the man would listen to his concerns. He was also sure that Stan Edgar wouldn’t believe that there was a way for the dragon to return home, so he would probably tell Black Noir that he was allowed to help him return home in any way possible on the assumption that he wouldn’t succeed, and that he wouldn’t do so if he was assigned to accomplish a task.

Black Noir was aware that he was becoming attached to the dragon far too quickly, but that didn’t matter to him. He knew that even though he would feel bad about it later, he wouldn’t hesitate to kill the dragon if it was required of him. He was a good soldier who did what he was told.

“Well, young dragon. I can assure you that you will have the full support of Vought and The Seven to get you back home. But, in the meantime, this is your home, and we want you to treat it like your home,” the purple dragon smiled.

“Thank you. You’re both very kind,” the dragon said. “I think that I’ll enjoy my time here, however long it lasts.”

“Well, that’s good, because I know that me and Black Noir will be happy to have you here with us.”

  
  



	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had a dream about slicing myself open with a scalpel on a busy street while everyone walks by without trying to help. Then, I told the police to let me die.

“So, champ, this is my home and you’ll be staying here with me for a while. I don’t have a space prepared for you right now. So until I do you can just sleep wherever you like,” Homelander was not fond of letting the dragon have total freedom within his home. He was planning on making sure that the dragon didn’t overstep the boundaries that existed within his head.

“When do you help people?” The dragon, Oryps, asked. The dragon told the superhero his name, but Homelander barely acknowledged it.

“I help people whenever they need help,” Homelander stated. “Unless, of course, someone else is already helping them. We have a lot of capable superheroes here at Vought helping a lot of people,” Oryps seemed like he doubted the superhero, which really pissed Homelander off.

“I can smell someone being raped in this building right now, and no one is helping them,” Oryps gave the air a long sniff and he grimaced immediately afterward. “Yes, tears, sweat, semen, blood. It smells awful,” he looked at Homelander with a cynical expression, as though he doubted that Homelander would lift a finger to help the victim. Homelander wanted nothing more than to prove to the dragon that his doubts about him were true. He wasn’t a hero, he didn’t want to take care of a dragon, and he definitely didn’t want to deal with the hassle of stopping a rape at Vought. The company was probably already working on the cover-up.

However, the dragon’s eyes were hopeful, as though he desperately wanted to believe that despite his doubts, despite his gut telling him that Homelander wasn’t a hero, maybe he was a good person who would do what was right when given the chance.

Homelander very rarely got the opportunity to do the right thing spontaneously. Maybe it would be nice for him to stop a crime-in-progress without having to deal with the usual corporate bullshit. Maybe it would be nice for him to be an actual hero for a change.

“Okay, dragon. Lead the way. Let’s help someone,” Homelander looked down and saw that the dragon had already walked up to the door and was waiting for him.

Homelander followed the dragon as he ran through the Vought building looking for the rape that he smelled. Eyes were staring at Homelander as he passed by with the dragon in front of him, and Homelander felt incredibly stupid. Stopping a sex crime taking place in a corporate headquarters with his pet dragon, he felt like a superhero in a cartoon.

When he returned to his home, he would make sure that the dragon learned the way that the world really worked, that sex crimes in corporations filled with powerful men were common, and even encouraged. That in order for a woman to truly succeed, they had to have been raped, to the point where Homelander suspected that some women even baited it.

“Behind this door,” the dragon stated. Without waiting for Homelander’s acknowledgement, the dragon twisted the doorknob, opened the door, and ran inside. Homelander walked up to the open door to see what the dragon would do.

He could see a man, who looked like an important member of Vought, and a young dark-skinned woman bent over a desk. The dragon tackled the pants-less man to the ground and pinned him. The people in the halls heard the thumping sound, as well as the surprised shout, and they had already gathered around Homelander to see what was happening.

Some of the younger employees surrounding Homelander had taken out their phones and started filming the bizarre scene. Homelander suspected that they had their phones ready to film as soon as they saw the dragon walking around the halls with a determined look on his face.

“As long as I’m here, every person here is under my protection,” Oryps hissed at the terrified man. “If you touch anyone again, I will smell it, and I will come find you. Do you understand?” The man was still very scared, but when he turned his head to see Homelander watching him, he seemed to become a little more confident in his situation.

“You won’t do anything to me. If Stan Edgar finds out that his science experiment attacked a Vought executive, he’ll have you killed. Someone’s probably coming to kill you right now,” Homelander had a big smile on his face as he watched the executive nearly wet himself in terror as he tried to scare the dragon.

He didn’t want to simply be a bystander in the scene while cameras were filming, so he walked up to the scared young woman in front of the desk, desperately trying to compose herself.

“Are you okay?” Homelander asked as he placed his hand reassuringly on her shoulder. The woman seemed uncomfortable at the touch, but his reassuring smile seemed to calm her a little bit. She nodded her head, and it actually made Homelander feel good that he was helping the woman in such a small way. He imagined that he would feel a lot better if he had been the one to actually stop the rape.

“Homelander, what the fuck are you doing? Get this damn thing off of me!” The executive actually had the nerve to try to give Homelander commands, which pissed him off.

“Please, turn the cameras off,” the room went quiet when everyone heard the voice of Stan Edgar. All of the phones were immediately put away as Stan walked into the room with Black Noir following behind him.

“You are all free to listen to this, and to post the videos that you have recorded online. In fact, I am encouraging you to do so,” Stan Edgar said with a chilling monotone voice. Black Noir had his eyes completely focused on the dragon who still had the Vought executive pinned to the floor.

“Mr. West, the value of life is determined the same way that any resource is determined, by scarcity. There are many humans in the world, and there are many superheroes in the world, that is why the lives of normal citizens hold so little value,” the man pressed his finger on the little Vought pin on the executive’s shirt.

“This pin right here means that you are an executive in my company, which makes you more valuable than most people,” the man removed his finger from the man’s pin and he brought it to the head of the dragon. Then, he started to stroke the dragon as though he was a dog who had done a very good thing.

“This is the only dragon in the entire world, which makes him far more valuable than you could possibly imagine. If you think that our company would dare to kill this dragon just to protect you, then you are embarrassingly mistaken,” Stan Edgar removed his hand from the dragon’s head, then he turned and walked towards the door.

“Has your video finished uploading?” A young woman nodded her head. “Good. How many likes has it gotten?”

“20 retweets so far,” the man smiled brightly, while the executive on the floor seemed mortified.

“You can’t do this! Think about Vought’s reputation!” Stan Edgar turned to face the executive with fury in his eyes, and a disturbingly calm face.

“I am Vought, Homelander is Vought, this dragon is Vought. The video is good for everyone’s reputation except for yours, but that doesn’t matter. You are not Vought, you are fired,” with that final statement, Stan Edgar left the room.

  
  



	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel like the world is falling apart, so what's the point in continuing to write or really do much of anything? This story does seem to be becoming more popular than I expected, yet there are no comments or kudos, which seems a bit strange. I think that people are expecting a sex scene to take place, which will happen, probably, but not for a while.

Homelander was furious at the dragon. He was furious that he had humiliated him in front of Stan Edgar, Black Noir and all of the young Vought employees. He wasn’t supposed to be the bystander when a crime was happening, he was supposed to be the one saving the day and then being lavished with praise.

When they returned to his home, Homelander was prepared to tell the dragon exactly what he thought about him, and discipline him for what he had done.

“I hoped that this place would be different,” Oryps whispered mostly to himself. “It isn’t different anywhere. There’s always someone strong hurting someone weak because they can’t hurt them,” tears were starting to roll down the dragon’s face, and it amused Homelander that the dragon’s tears were bright pink.

“If I wasn’t here, that woman would have been raped. No one would have done anything,” the dragon was fighting back his sobs. “I feel so stupid for thinking that this place would be different.”

“It can be different,” Homelander had no idea what he was going to say next. “There are so many obstacles and so many people that are stopping us from doing what needs to be done to protect everyone. Me and you are different, we’re better, and we should be using our strength to make the world a better place,” Homelander was just making up his speech as he went along. He wasn’t sure how much of what he was saying he actually believed, all that he knew was that it seemed to be making the dragon feel better.

“Our country is becoming weaker, morals are degrading, and we need to set an example for America. We need to make our country great again, you and me,” the dragon’s eyes lit up. He stopped crying and looked at Homelander with admiration in his eyes.

Admiration that Homelander hungered for, admiration that Homelander found more addictive than any cigarette. It was at that moment that he knew that he could become addicted to making his new pet dragon feel good.

“Do you really mean that?” Homelander nodded his head without even thinking about what he was doing. He could feel himself getting drunk off of the look in the eyes of the dragon. He couldn’t remember the last time that he had felt so good.

“Of course I do, champ. I can’t lie to someone as special as you,” Homelander hated lying to the people he trusted. There weren’t many people who he could trust, or even who he considered to be an equal. He was so far above both humans and supes that he had no one who he could consider to be a real friend.

But the dragon felt different. It felt like he knew exactly how Homelander felt, which excited the superhero.

_ Knock knock. _

A knock on his door broke the brief moment of silence between the two. Homelander considered telling whoever was at the door to leave, but he didn’t want to seem crass in front of the dragon. Their relationship was starting to feel as though it was going somewhere, and he didn’t want to end a friendship before it truly began.

“Please, come in,” Homelander spoke using the voice he used when speaking to large crowds of adoring fans. The door opened and Homelander wasn’t surprised to see Madelyn walk into his home. He had been expecting the woman to call him into her office to talk about what the dragon had done, he hadn’t expected her to come to him instead.

“The whole tower is talking about what you two did,” Madelyn said. “Anti-corporate sentiment is at an all-time high, people are becoming bored of superheroes and want something new,” a bright smile was on Madelyn’s face as she reached into her pocket to pull out her phone.

“People are angry at superheroes not doing enough to help minorities and women,” she pulled out her phone and began typing, searching for something. When she found what she was looking for, she turned her phone so that Homelander could see that one of the videos taken of the attempted rape had accumulated more than 50 million views on Youtube.

“This was the perfect PR move. Homelander and a dragon save a black woman from a sleazy corporate asshole. The internet is abuzz with pro-Vought and pro-Homelander memes. You’ve never been this popular before,” Homelander doubted that. He believed that he was at his most popular after he had starred in his first blockbuster movie, and it became the highest-grossing movie of all time.

“Whoa. Did you hear that, champ? You’re famous,” Madelyn nodded her head, and the dragon silently stared at the phone with the video playing on it. Homelander wondered if the dragon was confused by what Madelyn had told him. He probably didn’t know what the internet, or a phone, or a meme even was.

“Vought’s public profile is at an all-time high, just because of a single video. Stan Edgar was elated when he heard the news,” Homelander could feel his jealousy burning him a little bit. He remembered when he had been the one to boost public opinion of Vought to greater heights.

“It seems a bit too perfect,” Oryps mumbled to himself. Homelander could hear what he had said, but Madelyn apparently didn’t hear him, or didn’t want to acknowledge what the dragon was implying.

“I had my doubts about you at first, but it’s clear to me now that you’re exactly where you belong. In fact, Stan wanted me to tell you that he has commissioned a suite in the tower just for you,” everything was happening for the dragon far too fast, which made Homelander a bit suspicious.

“If the dragon keeps on bringing us such positive media coverage, maybe he could actually join The Seven,” Homelander was definitely not being serious when he suggested that the dragon might actually have a place on his team as anything but a mascot. Madelyn was fully aware of that.

“Well, that’s all that I wanted to say. I hope that I wasn’t interrupting anything,” Homelander had to struggle to smile at the woman and avoid telling her what he truly felt.

“You weren’t interrupting anything important, me and Oryps were just having a bit of guy time. We’re already such good friends,” that had been probably the first time that Homelander had actually said the name of the dragon. Madelyn nodded her head, then she left the room almost immediately afterward.

“Are they the bad guys?” Oryps asked the superhero. “It feels like they wanted me to be here, and they wanted me to save that woman. If they are the bad guys, then maybe they brought me here in the first place,” Homelander had considered that possibility. Vought had a lot of secrets, so it wouldn’t surprise him to hear that they had taken the dragon from his home.

But, why would they just bring in a single dragon instead of a bunch of them if they could? He suspected that if they had a wicked plan for the dragon, they would have taken him immediately to a lab. If he was encouraged to stay with Homelander, maybe they had some other plan for the dragon.

“I think that they’re simply adapting to a strange situation,” Homelander explained. “You don’t need to worry about them as long as I’m here to protect you,” Oryps believed the superhero, which might have been a mistake, but he didn’t fully realize the danger that he was in.

  
  



	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I guess I'm feeling happier than I was a while ago, we'll see how long that lasts. I released a song using Landr, which I don't really have a lot of hope for. It's a good radio-friendly song that could fit on a variety of Spotify playlists, I think. But, I can't really promote it much. I've been told that it sounds like a song that would have appeared in Adventure Time, and I'm not sure if that's a compliment or not. To me, it kinda sounds like if Billie Eilish was a boy and a folk singer.

It was a quiet night, and Black Noir was unable to sleep soundly. The dragon kept on appearing in his thoughts, tempting him in various ways. Within the dragon he saw many possibilities for a relationship. The two of them could be friends, lovers, enemies, rivals or simply acquaintances who would smile at each other during meetings.

He hoped that he could become friends with the dragon. Being lovers would be nice as well, but Black Noir was sure that wouldn’t happen, if only because he suspected that at some point Stan Edgar would want the dragon to be killed.

“No… No…” His superhuman ears could hear the sound of the dragon talking in his sleep. He wanted to comfort him, to hug him, to kiss him and tell him that everything was okay, that he was safe in the tower, unless Stan wanted him dead.

But, he didn’t do that because he didn’t want to upset Homelander. He knew that the superhuman could have killed him with a single look if he wanted to, and he didn’t want to die. Or at least, he didn’t want to have to regenerate from fatal injuries.

“Noir, buddy,” Homelander’s voice disturbed the silence of Black Noir’s bedroom. He had heard the superhero fly in through his open window, but he hadn’t acknowledged him until he had spoken. He nodded his head and focused his attention entirely on Homelander, and he hoped that the superhero wouldn’t ask why he left his window open. It would have been embarrassing to admit that he had expected the dragon to fly around at some point and enter his room out of curiosity, or because he had similar feelings towards him.

“So, uh, Noir. I’m sure that you can hear our new friend talking in his sleep. Our scaly friend just can’t stop tossing and turning. Quite frankly, it’s a bit upsetting,” Black Noir knew what Homelander wanted from him, and Homelander knew that he knew what he wanted. Neither of the men wanted to say what they really felt.

“Look, Noir, I know what you’re thinking, and…” He paused as if he wasn’t sure what he wanted to say. “And, well, I guess you’re better at this kind of thing than I am. So, uh, comfort him or…” he paused again, for a few seconds longer than he did before. Black Noir loved the silence, but it was clear that Homelander was uncomfortable within the silence. He supposed that whether the dragon chose to love him or Homelander depended mostly on whether or not he enjoyed silence.

“Just, make him stop crying. It’s… Irritating,” Black Noir knew Homelander better than most, which was probably the reason why the superhero had asked for his help before anyone else. That, and the fact that he knew that Black Noir wouldn’t tell anyone that the superhero cared about the dragon.

The ninja nodded his head and placed his hand on Homelander’s shoulder as if to reassure him that he was perfectly capable of calming down the sleeping dragon. The superhero continued to have his doubts.

“Say, uh, Noir. I’m sure that you wouldn’t mind if I slept here, just for tonight. You can sleep in my bed if you want. It’s probably a lot more comfortable than, uh, this,” he gestured his head to Black Noir’s incredibly thin mattress. Before he joined Vought he had slept on the floor for most of his life. The ninja didn’t feel comfortable on a mattress that was too fluffy, and he liked his bed because of the lumbar support it provided.

The ninja nodded his head, and before Homelander had the chance to move towards the mattress the ninja had exited his room through the window leading outside. After moving along the outside wall like a spider, the ninja found Homelander’s open window and crawled inside.

He followed the sounds of sobbing to where the dragon was sleeping on Homelander’s living room floor. He was tossing and turning in his sleep, just as Black Noir expected.

“No, please, no, stop…” Black Noir’s keen eye noticed that the dragon was covering his bottom with one of his talons. He studied the dragon’s body, from his beautiful tail, to his deadly talons, to his elegant horns and his exposed genitals.

He was alone with the dragon, and if Homelander could be trusted, he would be alone with the dragon for the entire night. The thought excited him more than it should have.

But, those dirty thoughts would need to wait for another night. That night was about making the dragon feel good, not the ninja.

He gently placed his gloved hand on the top of the dragon’s head, and he started to calmly stroke his head as though he was a scaly dog. This seemed to work as the dragon stopped squirming for a moment and his agitated face contorted into a smile.

With his free hand, the ninja reached into one of the compartments on his suit and he pulled out what he considered to be his most valued tool, a grape-flavored sucker. The perfect thing to give to a child to calm them down, the perfect snack on a long journey, and the perfect thing to give to a good dragon who needed a treat.

He placed the sucker into the dragon’s mouth and within an instant the dragon chomped down on it. The ninja was mesmerized by the way that the dragon politely chewed and swallowed the candy. It was so easy to forget that the dragon wasn’t a domesticated pet.

“The dragon is very cute, isn’t he?” Black Noir wasn’t surprised to hear Stan Edgar’s voice from behind him. He was aware of the secret entrance to Homelander’s room that he suspected that the superhero was unaware of. Even if Homelander discovered it, there were about five others that Black Noir knew about, and he suspected that there were more. Privacy wasn’t a luxury that anyone had at Vought.

“Do you have any idea what that dragon has done for our public image and stock price in just a single day?” Black Noir didn’t bother paying attention to such things. But if Stan Edgar was happy, he was sure that the dragon had done good.

“There’s so much filth in this world, and too many secrets in this company. I had to compromise so much that you could say that I’m no longer a good person, and I always believed that I couldn’t be successful any other way. I always believed that you needed to fool the public to get their money, that you needed to hurt as many people as possible if you wanted to succeed in a business like this,” Edgar reached out his hand and took over the task of stroking the dragon from Black Noir. The ninja was surprised at how gentle the man was being with him.

“This dragon proved to me that there’s another way, that we don’t need to be the bad guys to succeed. I don’t know if you can hear me, dragon, but I’m grateful to you. You mean more to me than you will ever know,” the man turned his head to face Black Noir with a deathly serious expression on his face.

“If he ever leaves me, for any reason, I will be very upset. Do you understand?” The ninja nodded his head. He understood exactly what Stan was telling him.

“Good.”


	5. Chapter 5

Black Noir put together a platter of fruit to give to the dragon when he woke up in the morning. He knew that his desires weren’t the most moral or ethical things in the world, but working at Vought tended to erode any sense of morality a person had.

He knocked on Homelander’s door and he wasn’t surprised that he didn’t hear an answer. He pressed his ear against the door just to confirm that the suite was empty. It was, and he was relieved. The dragon wasn’t ignoring him, Homelander wasn’t mad at him, they were just not home, in the early morning.

At least, Black Noir thought it was the early morning. He looked down at his watch and he was surprised to see that it was actually closer to being the afternoon.

He looked down at the plate of intricately carved fruit arranged meticulously on his plate, and he considered the possibility that he had spent far too much time on preparing breakfast for the dragon.

“Ah, Black Noir, my dearest friend. Who did you prepare that delicious banquet for?” It bothered the ninja that Stan Edgar had so many secret passages in the Vought building. He was aware of about 20 of them in that hallway alone, which he thought was fairly excessive. Sometimes he wondered how many secret entrances there were in his room.

“Is it for me?” Black Noir shook his head and gestured towards the door as his way of answering his boss’s question. The man smiled as he reached down and plucked an apple that had been carved to look like the face of the dragon.

“I know who it’s for, my favourite ninja. On a professional level, I feel like I need to discourage you from pursuing the dragon. It would be far better for the company for Homelander to end up in a relationship with him,” the ninja felt his heart sink when he heard Stan’s words.

“However, on a personal level I would like to encourage you to pursue the dragon. Follow your heart, and fuck his brains out,” it was always incredibly cringy whenever Stan tried to talk like he assumed the average teenager or young adult would talk. However, Black Noir appreciated the sentiment.

“On that note, how would you go about being intimate with the dragon? Kissing him would be awkward, and, uh, actually nevermind, forget about that question. I don’t want to know the answer,” Black Noir was grateful that Stan was uncomfortable about the topic of sex. He really didn’t want to have to explain about his ideas about sex with a dragon to the man.

But, he did have some hand puppets in a compartment on his suit to explain what he wanted to the dragon. If Stan ever wanted to know the answer to his question, Black Noir would explain it using the same method.

\---

_ I wish that it was raining. _

The dragon longed for the feeling of raindrops against his scaly wings as he soared above the buildings below him. The people stared at him as he flew, and more than a few of them took pictures of him when they realized that he was above them.

He hoped that Vought wouldn’t mind him going for a leisurely flight around the city, and he suspected that Stan would have approved of the idea because of the publicity a dragon flying around the city would generate for the company, especially a dragon that had gone viral on social media sites the previous night.

The scent of blood grazed his nose, and he turned his attention towards the source of the smell. A young man, covered in blood and holding two severed hands.

A man dressed in blue turned to face him, his body covered with blood, brain, bones and skin. He stammered out an apology, then he dashed away at a speed that no human should have been capable of.

Even though the superhero was capable of running faster than the dragon’s eye could follow, he was able to tell where he was with his strong sense of smell. He managed to track the scent of the superhero, and when the superhero paused for a moment on the street, he dove towards him.

“Hey, what the-” The dragon pinned him to the ground and bared his teeth. He wasn’t sure whether or not the superhero was strong enough to push him away, and he wasn’t sure if he would get in trouble for threatening him or not. With his luck, the blue-suited superhero was someone important at Vought.

However, at that moment he didn’t care about Vought, he just wanted to do what he thought was the right thing to do.

“You killed that girl,” Oryps hissed. The man seemed to be trying to hide his fear, but it was clear to the dragon that the man was terrified. A small crowd of people were walking towards them with their phones out, and the blue superhero was wondering who he should fear more, Vought if the videos the people were going to record were posted online, or the snarling dragon.

“Look, man, it’s collateral damage. It happens. Every superhero kills a few people accidentally. It sucks, but, that’s just the way the world works,” the dragon squeezed his talons, digging them into the man’s arms and drawing blood.

“You’re no hero,” the dragon snarled as he brought his face closer to the superhero. “Heroes don’t kill innocent people, ever, for any reason,” his grip continued to tighten and the superhero began to whimper.

“How dare you try to excuse yourself for that woman’s death? Why do you think that you’re the one who needs to forgive yourself? Why do you think that accepting your mistakes justifies them?” The dragon released the superhero from his tight grip, and he crawled off of him, giving him the opportunity to breathe a little bit easier.

“You need to go to that poor boy and beg him to forgive you for what you did,” the superhero sneered at the dragon as he stood up.

“And what happens if I don’t? Are you going to kill me? Are you going to kill an innocent black man in front of all these cameras?” The dragon snarled and raised his talons. He wasn’t surprised to see the superhero flinch.

“You’re not innocent, and I won’t regret killing you,” he took a step forward towards the superhero. “You can run, but there isn’t anywhere that you can hide from me,” the superhero was convinced, and within an instant he started running towards the poor man who was still holding the remains of his dead girlfriend.

And then, the small crowd cheered for the dragon.


	6. Chapter 6

Stan Edgar stared at the computer screen as it played a video featuring A-Train being forced to acknowledge his misdeed by the dragon. He had a big smile on his face as he watched the video, because it was exactly what he wanted to happen.

Vought was a company created by the most foul, racist and sexist people to have ever lived. Once Stan was aware of that, he made a vow to do whatever he needed to do to clean up the company.

But, he couldn’t simply fire all of the evil people and hire good ones instead. He needed to do things a little bit differently. When he found a dragon in his office one morning, he was initially shocked, and when the dragon started speaking he was more scared than he had ever been in his life.

He had ordered the dragon to be shot by the snipers who were always watching him, but he was told that the snipers weren’t responding. The dragon, with his back turned to the man so that all he could see were his tiny deformed wings, stated that all of the snipers had been eliminated.

The dragon turned around so that Stan could see his mutilated face, his obviously blind eye and his four horns that were twisted in a way that made it look like he only had one massive horn. The dragon explained that where he was from he was a king, but he lost his throne to his apprentice after her mate murdered him.

In death, he was punished by a demigod who ruled over his world in secret while the more powerful deities waited in their own dimension for his world to end. His world was dying, and there was nothing the deities could do about it except to wait.

Knowing that he had no future in life or death in his world, he left his dimension and he brought his most trusted associate with him to Stan’s dimension.

In Vought, he saw the potential for a new kingdom to rule, but before he took control of the company he wanted to cleanse it of as much sin as he could. He claimed that sin and vice were diseases that needed to be purged before they destroyed his kingdom.

Stan Edgar agreed with the dragon, and he agreed to help him on the condition that he would have just as much power within the company as him until he died. The dragon agreed, and he remarked that he would live far longer than Stan would so it didn’t matter if he had to share the throne for the remainder of his human lifetime.

Black Noir had no idea about the existence of the dragon, or the plan that they had. Apparently, the dragon’s associate was a unicorn who did not want to speak to Stan. The unicorn requested a place to live for him and his daughter, so Stan arranged for him to be sent to the same place where he had sent Homelander’s son. He hoped that Billy’s wife wouldn’t mind the company, and Ryan could use a young friend.

Stormfront was likely aware of the dragon, to some extent. She knew about the secret passageways within the building, but she didn’t use them as much as Stan. She mainly just used the passages to spy on Stan to learn about his secret plans. He didn’t write any of his secrets on a piece of paper, or on his computer, so the only way to learn most of his secrets was to spy on him.

The plan that the two of them discussed involved bringing the heroic dragon who had slain the king into Stan’s dimension. However, the king decided to bring a different version of the dragon from a different dimension instead of the one from his dimension.

Stan had asked the king how he was able to do what he had done. The king told him that he had been given the power to travel across dimensions as long as he fulfilled the request of a powerful deity. Stan didn’t want to know what the request was.

\---

“Look, dude. I know this doesn’t mean much, but, I’m really sorry. This addiction, man, it’s- I just don’t want to lose it all, you know,” Hughie was paralyzed with anger and fear. He was unable to say or do anything to the man in front of him.

“I mean, I know what you’re thinking, man. A-Train is a millionaire and a big star, what does he have to complain about? Sure, he’s addicted to shit, but like, he has a pool, that makes it all better, right?” The blood was still clinging to the blue suit of the superhero. Hughie was only barely aware of what the superhero was saying to him.

“I mean, I think I own the pool, man, but I don’t. All that fame and fortune does to you is make you a slave, to your fans, to your managers, to your addictions. Shit, a black man being a slave, that ain’t cool. I don’t want to be anyone’s slave anymore,” Hughie wanted nothing more than to strangle the superhero. To feel his life leave his body as he died in his grip.

“I gotta get clean, man, to be a free man so that no other girl has to die like yours did. Like, dude, can you forgive me? I’m sick, I get that now, but I want to get better. I guess this is my first step,” the superhero held out his hand for Hughie to shake. The man stared at the hand for a few seconds, fighting the urge to slap it away.

Eventually, after a tense silence, Hughie placed the hand of his dead girlfriend against the palm of her killer. He then shook the hand up and down while glaring into A-Train’s eyes.

“Okay, okay, I understand. Look, I’ll talk to Vought and get you a nice big settlement. You’ll be rich, man, just like me. You’ll be famous, just like me. I mean, you probably already are, with the phone videos and stuff. Lots of people are probably talking about you,” that statement horrified Hughie for a reason that he couldn’t explain.

“I’ll talk to you later. I really am sorry, dude. I hope we can be friends, or something. I feel like I need to make this up to you,” the superhero ran away before Hughie could tell him to go fuck himself.


	7. Book Of Oryps: Chapter Five - Oryps

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A chapter from the original story where the original Oryps is from.

**Chapter 5: Oryps**

"I don't know why Owyps gives me cawwots, he knows I don't like them," Ekips grumpily murmured as he stared at the pile of vegetables in front of him. Oryps had left me some vegetables as well, and although I ate them, I would have preferred if he had given me some meat instead. Dragons weren't made to eat vegetables.

Still, it was nice to know that he cared about me enough to leave me something for my breakfast before he left.

"Maybe he got them for you to get you thinking about his penis," the dragon scowled when he heard my snarky question. I could be such a jerk sometimes. Also, I never learned what the word 'snarky' meant. Hopefully I used it correctly.

"Don't you have anything bettew to do than hang around here?" I shook my head. I had school to go to in the afternoon, but at that moment I really didn't have anything better to do than hang around the cave waiting for my beloved Oryps to return.

"He isn't pewfect," Ekips mumbled as he absent-mindedly played with his carrots. "He's just a dwagon like all of us. He's bwave and stupid," Ekips picked up one of the carrots.

"You wouldn't be alive if he didn't save you," Ekips scoffed and bit into his carrot. I could see the disgust in his face as he chewed the disgusting vegetable.

Ekips swallowed the carrot and glared at me. "Maybe I didn't want to be alive. Maybe I stayed in my egg fow so long because I wanted to die," the small dragon reached for another carrot.

"Look at me, I'm a pathetic wunt. I can't even steal eggs from a biwd's nest," the small dragon's grip tightened on the carrot.

"Did you know that my lungs collapsed when I was bown?" Ekips chuckled darkly. "If that isn't a sign from the deity of cweation that she didn't want me to live, then I don't know what is."

"Wait, then how did you, umm, you know," I hesitated. "How did you survive that?" Ekips bit into his carrot.

"Owyps cawwied me to the unicown town," Ekips explained as he chewed. I turned away from the dragon because I really didn't need to see the little bits of chewed vegetables in his mouth.

"That must have been his own pewsonal hell. He had to cawwy a wheezing, bawely-alive dwagon acwoss the valley just to beg the unicowns to save him," Ekips chuckled. "His only weward was that he had to take care of me for the west of his life," the small dragon picked up another carrot from the pile.

"What a gweat weward," Ekips muttered to himself. "Look at me, I'll be a pathetic baby for the west of my life and Owyps will..." the dragon wiped the tears that were dripping from his eyes. "Owyps will have to take cawe of me fowever and..." Ekips paused.

I felt sorry for the dragon. It would have been my dream to have Oryps take care of me for the rest of my life, but it seemed like for him it was a nightmare that he would never wake up from.

"Ekips, I think he wants to take care of you," I felt like I had to make him feel a little bit better about himself. If Oryps were there he wouldn't want to see the little dragon crying. Also, I was pretty sure that he was considering drowning himself in the small pool of bright pink water, judging by the way he was looking at it.

"Of couwse he wants to take cawe of me," Ekips growled. "He's Owyps, he wants to take cawe of evewyone. But, I don't want him to take cawe of me, I want to take cawe of myself," Ekips slapped the pile of vegetables away from him.

The young dragon angrily sat on the ground and folded his arms. "I just don't want to be tweated like a baby anymowe, I want..." Ekips hesitated as though he wasn't sure of what he could say. "I want, all that I want is to be seen as, I don't know, an actual dwagon."

"Not a baby dwagon, but a dwagon who can hunt for his own food," Ekips wiped the remaining tears from his face and attempted to smile.

"I guess that's a lot to ask for someone like me," Ekips picked up one of the carrots scattered on the ground.

My ears perked up when I heard the sounds of footsteps. I expected to see Oryps when I turned to look at the entrance of the cave.

"Erif, what are you doing here, baby?" Ambrosia, my school teacher, was standing at the entrance to the cave. Her scales were dirty and covered with what looked like scratches. I wondered how she got the scratches because, as far as I knew, Ambrosia had never been in a fight and she had no desire to fight with any creature, dragon or otherwise.

"Oryps saved me from a kishunimara last night," I hoped that she wouldn't ask any follow-up questions. "Umm, Ambrosia, what's with your, umm, everything," I pointed at her scales. "Like, the scratches and stuff. What happened to you?"

"It doesn't matter. Where's Ekips, baby?" Ambrosia's blue eyes spent a few seconds scanning the cave until she appeared to have spotted the small dragon.

"Ekips, I have a very important job for you, baby," the small dragon shook his head and growled.

"Miss Ambwosia, I don't want youw job," Ekips bitterly said. "You'we pwobably just gonna ask me to find Owyps and tell him something," Ambrosia shook her head.

"Ekips, I need you to rescue Oryps, baby," my eyes widened.

"Ambrosia, did you just say that Oryps needs to be rescued?" Ambrosia nodded her head. I was speechless. Oryps shouldn't have ever needed to be rescued by anyone, especially not by me and Ekips.

"Oryps was taken to the city by a powerful dragon, baby," Ambrosia glared at the scars on her arms. "The dragon also took the last kishunimara with him, baby," my mouth was agape. "The last kishunimara? What the heck happened to all the others?"

"The powerful dragon killed them, baby," Ambrosia explained. "But that doesn't matter, baby. Listen to me, someone very bad is going to do something terrible to my mate, baby. I need to save the dragon I love, baby, and you need to save the dragon you love, baby," Ambrosia turned around and started walking towards the cave entrance.

"Please, save my friend, baby, somehow," Ambrosia ran out of the cave, leaving me alone with the small grumpy dragon.

"Ekips, you don't have to come with me, but I'm going to the city," I heard Ekips scoff.

"Oh weally? What awe you gonna do when you get thewe, huh? Kill the big scary dwagon?" I nodded my head and Ekips scoffed again.

"You'we gonna have to carry me," I spun around to face the dragon who was staring at me with a completely serious expression on his face, which was definitely not what I expected to see. I thought that he would be snickering at the joke that he had just told.

"You can't be serious," I said to him. "You can't expect me to carry you to the city."

"I'm sewious," Ekips said. "Look at me, it'll take me fowever to walk to the city and I might not suwvive the trip. Lots of dwagons want me dead," I wasn't sure if he was joking or not, but he made a pretty convincing argument.

"Ekips, I'm not carrying you," I didn't like the way that the tiny dragon smirked at me.

"What if I make you a deal? If you cawwy me to the city, I'll tell Owyps what a kind dwagon you wewe," the offer was pretty tempting. If Ekips told Oryps that I had carried him across the valley, Oryps might actually think that I was worthy of being his mate.

"You can get on my back," I said to the dragon. "But you had better tell Oryps how great I am," the small dragon smirked.

"Oh, don't wowwy about that," the small dragon said. "You can considew it done."

\---

_ What are you waiting for? Kill them all. _

I shook my head when I heard the familiar raspy voice. I had been hearing that stupid voice telling me to kill other creatures since the day that I was born. When I was young I traveled to the pit of snakes to see my father. I asked him if hearing a voice in my head telling me to kill creatures and have sex with creatures was normal.

_ "Orypsss, my ssson. It isssn't normal to hear a voice in your head. You mussst alwaysss underssstand what'sss right and wrong. You mussst never allow the voice to corrupt you." _

I had tried to follow my father's advice, but it wasn't always easy. There had been many times when I thought that it might just be easier to give up and allow the voice to take control of my body.

"Think friend... Dead," Australia was walking on my right side and Greed was walking on my left. The kishunimara seemed to be trying to be as close to me as possible while the red panda appeared to be lost in thought. I knew that none of them would want to be near me if they knew about the voice in my head and what it was telling me to do.

_ The creature ate your wing, you must eat her. _

"If you hadn't made your wissh I would have died. Thank you," the kishunimara smiled and cuddled up against me.

_ Kill her, fuckface. _

"Glad friend no dead," Australia purred. "Too much dead," I knew that I needed to defeat Priapism somehow, if only to avenge the dead kishunimaras. Night Star was a necessary evil that needed to exist, and Priapism had killed him due to his childish understanding of morality, as well as his narcissism.

_ Kill his son. _

I would never kill an innocent creature like Greed. I believed that even though his father had done terrible things I should not assume that he was evil. If the red panda did do something terrible, I would punish him and perhaps kill him if he tried to kill me. But, until he did something terrible I couldn't assume that he was evil.

_ He doesn't think that you're evil, and he's wrong. Kill the fuckface. _

"We need Ssheepfucka," I said to the two creatures. "He'll end up at Manko'ss house eventually if he'ss not already there, sso that'ss where we'll go," Australia nodded her head happily just like I knew that she would.

"Erm, who's Manko?" Greed asked. "And why would Sheepfucka go to her house? Are they friends or something?" I couldn't help myself from snickering when he asked if Sheepfucka considered Manko to be a friend.

_ You should have killed that bitch. _

"He promissed her that he'd play with her the next time he ssaw her. Manko never forgetss a promisse, and Ssheepfucka never breakss a promise," I explained. "I can guarantee that Ssheepfucka will end up at her housse at some point if he issn't there already."

_ The red panda is cute. You should fuck him. _

I shook my head. It was easy to try to ignore the raspy voice when it was telling me to kill my friends, but it was harder to ignore it when it was telling me to have sex with my friends. Most of the time my friends wanted me to have sex with them, which was weird. It actually made me more than a little bit uncomfortable.

_ I keep telling you to kill your horny friends, and you never fucking listen. _

"Oryps!" I heard a familiar voice as well as the sounds of hurried footsteps. I looked in the direction that the sound was coming from, and I saw the dragon that I had saved earlier from a kishunimara.

_ Do you know what would be fun? Murdering that bastard. _

My eyes brightened when I saw my beloved Ekips asleep on his back. It amazed me that the little dragon wasn't falling off as Erif ran towards me.

_ Rape him. Rape them. Rape them all, then kill them and eat their corpses. You've done it before. _

"I'm so glad I found you!" Erif exclaimed once he was close to me. "Ambrosia told me that a strong dragon had captured you and that we needed to save you. Heh, I guess I shouldn't have been worried," Australia stared at the red-scaled dragon curiously.

"Dragons friends?" Erif's eyes widened in terror when he heard the voice of the kishunimara walking beside me.

"O-Oryps! W-w-why is that, t-that thing beside you?" Australia grinned at the dragon before she cuddled against my body.

_ The dragon's a racist. You can kill him and you wouldn't even feel bad. _

"Friends, family, dead. Friends dragons now," Australia tried her best to explain the situation, but she wasn't doing a good job.

"Night Sstar iss dead and sso are the resst of the kisshunimarass. Sshe'ss the only one left," I pointed at the blue collar around my neck. "The dragon who killed Night Sstar put thiss around my neck. He wantss me to return to him in three dayss with Xnoy and Ssaffire."

_ You should have killed him. _

"Xnoy and Saffire aren't real, they're just characters in a bedtime story," Erif seemed unsure of himself. "I mean, Xnoy can't be real. Even if she was, Saffire died in the story."

"Xnoyby is real!" Saffire's ethereal body rose up from the ground in front of the young dragon. "And so am I!"

_ Rape that fucking ghost. _

The ghost dragon glared at Erif who seemed to be dumbstruck by the existence of the creature. I would have been much more shocked by her existence if I hadn't already been aware of the realm of the dead.

I shuddered as I remembered when Telia took me to the Well Of Souls on the anniversary of our secret wedding. My father had requested that I, a prince of snakes, marry the unicorn in order to bring peace to the two colonies. I also had to consummate our marriage, and Telia needed to give birth to a child

The wedding was the main reason why I had lied to Erif and claimed that I was asexual. It was also the reason why I could never claim Ekips as my mate. As long as I was married to Telia, I couldn't choose another dragon to be my mate.

\---

On our wedding anniversary, Telia took me to the Well Of Souls along with our 3-month old son which we named Thorn. Our daughter, Than, had died during childbirth, and Telia wanted to visit her in the realm of the dead.

"Thiss issn't healthy," I said to Telia as we stood in front of the large round stone in the center of the town. I was holding Thorn in my arms as he slept because Telia didn't want to touch the child. I knew that she hated the child because it looked like "an abomination," and that she wished that her other child had survived instead.

"Oryps, you know that I don't care. You can leave me alone if you're scared," the black-coated unicorn stepped in front of the stone and tapped it three times with her hoof. I watched as the giant stone transformed into a cloud of smoke.

Within the smoke, I could see the dark section of the realm of the dead where the spirits who weren't fortunate enough to be born as dragons or unicorns were floating aimlessly. I pitied the spirits who floated around with no purpose, no emotions and no memories from the life they had lived before they died.

I could also see the areas covered with light. The first area was where the spirits of the dragons went when they died, the second was where the spirits of unicorns went when they died. In those areas, the spirits were allowed to have emotions, and they were allowed to cherish the memories they had of being alive. Most importantly, they were able to watch their loved ones in the realm of the living.

"Telia, thiss really issn't healthy," the black unicorn turned and glared at me.

"Don't you dare lecture me, you cheating swine. You think about having sex with dragons all of the time. Our baby was doomed before it was born. Your impurity is what made him so deformed," the unicorn didn't understand that, although dragons mated for life, dragons were still allowed and encouraged to have sex with other dragons. When I had sex with dragons it made them feel good, which made me feel good. I wasn't going to stop even though I knew that it upset Telia.

_ One of your children died inside of her. Kill her, now. _

"Telia, I'm not going to explain mysself to you again," I growled at the unicorn. "Manko needss me to have ssex with her to boosst her confidence," Telia scoffed.

"While you're having sex with pretty dragons, I'm raising our son all alone. Do you know how it feels to be a mother living in a home?" Telia was getting angrier, and I could see her purple-eyes begin to transition to a dark red. I knew very well what would happen if she ever allowed herself to be consumed by the red because I knew that it would be similar to what would happen if I allowed myself to stop resisting the voice in my head.

"You're the one who told me that I couldn't be with him," I growled at her. "I never wanted a sson, and I never wanted to be married to a cold-hearted unicorn. The only reasson we're married iss because my homophobic dad wanted me to do it," Telia was the only unicorn that could ever make me lose my temper.

"I never wanted a son either," Telia turned away from me. "Oryps, it hurts not having you around. I know you don't love me, but I've seen how you look at Thorn. You love him in a way that I, just..." a tear fell down Telia's face. "...Can't..." Telia actually spoke a sentence without rhyming, which worried me because she only stopped rhyming if she was too upset to think up rhymes. 

"I can't leave my colony to come here and be the hussband you need or the father Thorn needss," I admitted to the unicorn. " Even if you did want me around, I couldn't be the dragon you need. I'm ssorry."

A moment of silence.

"You're scared," Telia murmured. "You're scared of being a father," I nodded my head.

"Yess, Telia, I'm sscared of being a father. I'm sscared of leaving my friendss and sspending the resst of my life with you and Thorn," the baby smiled when he heard me say his name. I truly loved my son, and it hurt me whenever I saw him smile because it was his way of showing me that he loved me too. That smile just made it harder to stay away from him, even though I knew why I had to.

_ Kill the child, kill the mother. _

"Oryps, if I let you, would you spend a bit of time in our home? I'm not sure if I want to raise our son alone," Telia looked at me with pleading eyes.

It was so hard to argue with her when she stared at me with those trembling, watery eyes. As much as I hated being married to her, I did have to admit that I felt some affection for her. I just didn't feel enough affection for her to leave my life completely behind to be with her.

"I'll think about it," Telia nodded her head.

"I'm not expecting anything more. Now, let's see our dead daughter through this door," I smirked at the unicorn.

"That rhyme wass really bad," Telia chuckled, which was a very rare thing. Her laugh sounded beautiful, and it was a shame that she didn't laugh more often. Maybe if she did I could actually find myself loving her.

_ That rhyme was bad, kill her. _

"They can't all be gems."

\---

Me and my group of followers had arrived in front of the door to Manko's home. I could hear the excited voice of the dragon from within the house, as well as the irritating clucking of her chickens.

"So, umm, are you an actual ghost?" I rolled my eyes. Erif had been asking variations of the same question for the past 15 minutes.

"Yes, I'm a ghost," Saffire said. "I died and now I'm a ghost. Now, would you mind asking me something else?" Saffire smiled to herself. "Maybe you'd like to ask me about how amazing Xnoyby is, or how I died?"

"Sorry, it's just, you're an actual ghost," Erif still seemed to be trying to understand the implications of a ghost actually existing. "I mean, you're a ghost. That's pretty, umm, well... Are you really a ghost?"

"Yess, sshe'ss a ghosst," I knocked on the door. I heard a loud screech from within the home, as well as a loud bang. I grimaced as I thought of the damage that Manko must have done to something in her home.

"Oryps!" The door was flung upon and Manko tackled me to the ground. She planted a lot of kisses on my face, although I couldn't feel any of them because her beak was covering her lips. It felt like she was repeatedly hitting my face with a cardboard box.

"Oryps! I can't believe that you remembered that my birthday is in a month! Oh, wow, you must have come to give me my present early!" Manko winked at me in a way that she probably thought was seductive, but it just looked very goofy.

"Oi, Oryps buddy. Ya should give her a present," Sheepfucka chuckled at me from inside the house. "Give her the present in front of all your new friends."

I glared at Sheepfucka, and the furry dragon snickered. I guessed that Manko had finally told him that I was the one who had taken her virginity. It was inevitable that he would find out eventually, but that was a very bad day for him to learn my secret.

"I need to talk to you, privately," the furry dragon nodded his head.

"Oh Oryps, ay'm sure ya do," Sheepfucka walked up to Manko and forcefully pulled her off of me, much to her disappointment. "Ay need ta talk ta ya too. So, why don't ya come on in."

I stood up and walked inside the house, and Sheepfucka followed me. When we were both in the house, Sheepfucka shut the door to give us some privacy.

"Ya fucked Manko," I nodded my head and he grinned. "That's so fucking cringy, bud," maybe another day I would have been willing to talk with him about my sex life. But, I had much more important things to talk about than where I put my penis.

"Ssheepfucka, there'ss ssomething more important that we need to talk about," I explained to him. "Do you remember that the kisshunimara ssaid that Night Sstar had been killed?"

"Yeah, ay remember," Sheepfucka said. "Ay'm guessing that the dragon who killed him is very bad," Sheepfucka tapped the blue collar on my neck and smiled. "Ay mean, he must be bad if he gave ya this ugly collar," I nodded my head.

"Ssheepfucka, he wantss to control the world," Sheepfucka snorted indignantly.

"Oryps, we've dealt with that shit before, we'll deal with it again," I shook my head. I admired his innocence and his bravery, even if the bravery came from ignorance.

"Thiss iss different. Thiss dragon iss much sstronger than any other dragon I've ever sseen," I turned my head away from my friend.

"Ssheep, we've been friendss for a long time and we've fought sso many foess together. Have you ever sseen me afraid?" I turned my head to look at my friend, and for a moment I let him see the real me. Scared of Priapism, unsure of myself and embarrassed to show him such a vulnerable side of me.

"Well, umm, ay have now," Sheepfucka murmured. "Umm, Oryps, ya feeling alright?"

"No," I could feel my eyes droop. I felt nauseous and all that I wanted to do was lie on the ground and curl up in a ball. I wanted to sleep so badly, but I knew that I couldn't because I had a quest to complete.

_ Kill him, he knows too much. Then kill the girl. _

"Ssheep, I-"

\---

I ran up to the dragon and caught his body as it fell limp. It wasn't the first time that he had passed out, and it wouldn't be the last. I really wished that he would take better care of himself, or at least slept when he felt a bit tired. It couldn't have been healthy for him to deprive himself of sleep until he passed out.

"Come on bud, let's find a warm bed for ya," I held his body in my arms and I started wandering around the home looking for a bed.

"There's gotta be a bed around here somewhere, unless..." I shook my head as I thought about Manko sleeping on the dirty floor.

"Nah, Manko wouldn't do that, she's, erm, actually, maybe..." I vomited a little bit in my mouth as I thought about her disgusting body lying on the dirty floor. It would definitely explain the chicken poop that covered her.

"Ya can be pissed off at me when ya wake up," I lowered his body onto what looked like a comfortable spot on the floor. "Ay'll, umm, see ya when ya wake up."

\---

I was just a little dragon in the darkness. The shell of the egg was so strong, and I was too weak to break it.

I remembered being vulnerable, I remembered hoping that I could be just a little bit stronger so that I could escape from the prison. I was so young, so naive and so desperate to exit my safe egg.

I used all of my strength to break through the shell. When I was outside of my shell I was able to see the inside of the cave. The other eggs were unbroken, and my mother was sleeping.

"M-mommy, pleasse wake up," one of my mother's eyes opened and she smiled at me. A coldness in my heart that I wasn't aware of disappeared.

"Hello little one," she said quietly to me. "Would you like to have a name?" I happily nodded my head. I was so excited to have a name, and so hungry. I needed to eat something soon and I hoped that my mother would give me something to eat.

"Hmmm, well, I was saving this special name for a brave young dragon," my mother studied me for a moment. "What do you think of the name: Oryps?"

"I love it!" I shouted without hesitation. My stomach growled, and my mother continued to smile at me.

"It sounds like you're a bit hungry," I nodded my head. I remembered this part of the dream, or was it a memory? I guessed it was both. I didn't want to relive the memory, I wanted to wake up. I didn't ever want to dream ever again.

"If you go outside you'll see a big forest full of rabbits," my mother said. "Hunt them, kill them, and eat them," I was scared and my mother nudged me gently with her enormous talons. Every animal was scary to a baby dragon, even the tiny rabbits.

"Don't be frightened, little one, you'll do fine," the words of my mother boosted my confidence. I exited the cave and walked to the forest.

That was the last time that I was ever an innocent baby dragon.

I entered the forest and I killed a baby rabbit. I ate the flesh and I immediately spit it out. The rabbit tasted disgusting, and I didn't think that any other animal would taste good.

I found a bush of red berries and I ate a few of them. The sweet taste of the berries was absolutely wonderful, especially when compared to the gross flesh of the rabbit.

"You're a little cutie," I heard a male dragon say as he walked towards me.

"No no, little daffodil, I saw him first. You can have the next one," a female dragon grabbed me and held me in a tight embrace. I felt her stroke my scales and I relaxed in her embrace.

I wanted to bite her. I knew what would happen. I had been there so many times, but it never got easier.

"There there little baby, momma's gonna take good care of you," she reached down and wrapped her talons around my penis. I squirmed and I started to struggle. Even when it first happened I knew that what she was doing wasn't right.

"How about we share the cutie?" No! I didn't want to be here! I wanted to leave and never come back!

I'm never gonna fall asleep again.

My mouth was forced in front of the vagina of the female dragon, while the male dragon pushed his talon into my butthole. He was preparing my body for his-

"Little daffodil, don't be shy. We're all here to be satisfied," I wanted to leave so badly.

"Come on now, do what feels natural," that did not feel natural at all. But, I licked her body and I heard her moan in approval as she stroked my horn.

"Yes, just like that, little daffodil. You're doing so well," I kept on licking because I was sure that the dragon would hurt me if I didn't.

"Hmmm, I think the cutie is ready now," the male dragon removed his talon from inside of my body. I was so focused on satisfying the female dragon that I forgot that I even had a talon in my butt.

"Now I get to have my fun!" I yelped in pain as I felt his small penis being thrust inside of me. Even though his penis was small for the standards of a fully-grown dragon, for a baby like me it felt enormous.

"You're hurting the little daffodil. You have to be more gentle," the female dragon calmly stroked my head. She was attempting to calm me, to reassure me that everything would be okay. But, it would never be okay. I would have to live with the memory for the rest of my life.

"It's okay little daffodil, you just have to relax," I didn't want to relax. I wanted it to be over with as fast as possible. I... I... I...

"Mommy!" I shrieked. The male dragon laughed at me, and the female dragon cooed.

"Aww, that's so sweet. He wants his mommy."

They used my body for what felt like hours. When they were done they left me in the forest alone, broken and covered with fluids. I whimpered to myself as I stared at the bright blue liquid leaking from my butt.

I made two promises to myself. The first promise that I made was that I would become stronger so that what happened to me would never happen to me again. I never wanted to feel as though I was weak and powerless ever again.

The second promise that I made was that I would hunt for rabbits and bring their bodies to the cave to feed to the babies. I didn't want any of them to enter the forest and be raped by the waiting sexual predators.

_ Kill them. _

I shuddered when I heard the voice in my head for the first time. I knew that it would be in my head for the rest of my life, constantly telling me to do bad things. But, I knew what it felt like to be the victim. I couldn't bring myself to be the villain, to kill, to rape or to hurt the innocent.

_ They aren't innocent. Kill them. _

"No!" I yelled. "No! I won't lissten!"

_ Kill them. _

"No! No! Jusst p-p-pleasse leave me alone! Leave me alone! Leave me-"

\---

"-Alone," I woke up covered with sweat and lying on the ground in Manko's home. Australia was lying beside me, staring at me with a concerned expression. I wasn't sure where the rest of my friends were.

_ You should have killed them. _

"Friend had bad dream," Australia whispered to me. The kishunimara was so close to me, and her tail was wrapped around my waist in a way that was very comforting to me after my terrible dream.

"It's okay, friend," Australia licked my forehead gently. "I'm here. I'll help you," the black-furred creature tried her best to comfort me, but I didn't want to be comforted. I just wanted to be alone with my thoughts.

_ She won't leave you alone. Kill her, fuckface. _

"We need to go. We need to- Ah-choo!" I covered my mouth as I sneezed. Australia's concerned eyes narrowed and she placed her arms around my body, trapping me in a tight embrace.

"Sick, tired, sad, scared. You will sleep," Australia's tone was firm but compassionate. The only thing that she cared about was my physical and mental health, which I had often neglected.

_ Kill her. _

"Oi, she's right bud, ya gotta sleep," I heard Sheepfucka's voice from across the room.

"Ya're protected pretty well by that little gal. She won't let anyone near ya while ya sleep," I smirked at my friend.

"Iss that why you're over there," Australia blushed and Sheepfucka nodded his head.

"Yeah, she tried ta bite me," Sheepfucka winced. "A few times, actually. The gal's very protective of ya."

"Love friend," Australia cuddled me affectionately as she held me in her tight embrace. "Friend all I have. No friends, no family... All dead, just friend," I felt so bad. The creature believed that I was the most important thing in her life. She had no idea about the voices in my head, or the horrible things that I had done.

Of course, nothing that I had experienced would have ever been comparable to what she had gone through. It couldn't have been easy living under the rule of Night Star, and it couldn't have been easy for her to have seen all of the kishunimaras die.

"Ausstralia, you don't need to take care of me," Australia shook her head defiantly.

"Someone needs to take care of you," Australia hissed. "I take care of you, you take care of me... Me, you, friends."

"She's right, bud. Ya don't have ta deal with this alone. We're here for ya," Sheepfucka walked up to me cautiously, as though he was terrified of Australia trying to bite him again. Thankfully, Australia seemed to be entirely focused on cuddling against me and she didn't seem to care about him at all.

_ Kill her, kill them both right now. _

"Oryps, listen, ay don't say this often but, ya're like a brother ta me," Sheepfucka was standing directly in front of me, staring at me with his warm brown eyes.

"It hurts ta see ya destroy yourself. Please, Oryps, stop retreating inside yourself. Let me help ya, Whatever demons you're fighting, we can fight them together. Ya just gotta let me help ya," I turned my head away from him because I didn't want my best friend to see me cry.

_ Kill them all. Kill them before you tell them anything. _

"It issn't eassy," I could feel the tears forming in my eyes. If Australia wasn't restraining me, I would have wiped the tears away with my arm.

"Oryps, ay know it ain't easy. But, ya won't heal if ya don't talk about it," Sheepfucka was so concerned about me and willing to listen. He would have done anything to help me, as would Australia. But, I couldn't allow them to know the pain that I feel because it would only burden them. I didn't want to be a burden to them. I didn't want to be a weight that weighed them down.

"I'm ssorry, I just can't. Not now, not ever," both Sheepfucka and Australia seemed disappointed.

"Oryps, Australia watched her entire species die, and ay was almost killed when ay was a baby by our colony. What could have possibly happened to ya that is worse than that?" He had a point, maybe I was being selfish.

_ Kill him. Kill him now. _

"Ssheep, pleasse. I jusst can't. I'm not sstrong enough," Sheepfucka scoffed.

"Oryps, ya're the strongest dragon ay know. Ya can do this. Just talk ta me," I shook my head. I couldn't possibly tell him that I was raped when I was baby, nor could I tell him that I could hear voices in my head. It felt like every moment of my life was a punishment for my misdeeds in a previous life.

"Aight, well, when you're ready ta talk, ay'll be ready ta listen," I felt so bad. Sheepfucka only wanted to help, and I just wasn't strong enough to let him help me.

"Australia, don't ya dare stop hugging him for even a moment," Sheepfucka commanded. "Ay think he needs all the love he can get."

_ Kill them all. _

\---

I remembered the terrible day that Ekips hatched from his egg. He had never been strong enough to break the egg shell to free himself, but eventually he grew to be big enough that his body became too big for the egg to contain. I saw his horns penetrate the shell, and I decided to intervene.

I broke the egg shell and freed my little brother from the shell, but that ended up being a big mistake. The broken shells penetrated his skin, and the little dragon screeched in pain.

Then, he stopped screeching and he became limp. I could hear him breathing, so I knew that he wasn't dead. But I knew that he wouldn't stay alive for very long if he didn't have medical attention.

I couldn't take him to a dragon for help. Dragons were notorious for not helping injured or sick dragons. If a dragon lost a limb, they were expected to either die or learn to live without the limb that they lost.

The only option that I had was to bring the baby dragon to the town of unicorns. But, there was no guarantee that they would heal the dragon. Getting there wouldn't be easy because I would need to travel past the snake pit where the giant snakes lived.

But, a dragon needed my help, and I had to do something to help him.

_ Let the fucker die. _

I placed him on my back and I carried his body across the valley to the town. The dragons saw me carrying his body, but they didn't interfere with my quest because they thought that he was dead. If Ekips had been unfortunate enough to have been conscious during the journey, he might have said something and the dragons would have murdered him.

Fortunately, the journey to the town was mostly uneventful. The snakes were asleep, the dragons didn't care about the supposed dead dragon on my back, I didn't stumble upon any stray kishunimaras hunting for food and no unicorns wandering outside of town gave me any trouble.

The only thing that made my journey difficult was having to feel the dragon's laboured breathing and uneven heartbeat on my back as I carried him. It hurt me to feel him struggling as he clung to life, especially since I knew that there was nothing that I could do to help him, except hope that the unicorns could perform a miracle.

"Hey little buddy, we're here. You're going to be alright. Just hold on for a little bit longer," the little dragon didn't respond, but I couldn't let myself lose hope. I needed to believe that he would survive to convince myself to continue moving forward.

"The mighty Uchinos demands that you leave now, foul beast!" The shout of a unicorn assaulted my ears, and I was worried that the unicorn would give me a difficult time. The unicorns always hated valley dragons, but they seemed to have good relations with the city dragons. However, that didn't mean anything because the city dragons rarely, if ever, left their city, and the unicorns almost never left their town.

"My friend needss help. Iss there anyone here who can help him?" The pink-coated unicorn stared at the dying dragon on my back. When he smiled wickedly, I resisted the urge to hurt him.

_ Kill the bastard. _

"The mighty Uchinos thinks he looks pretty fucked up," resisting the urge to hurt him became a little more difficult. "The mighty Uchinos thinks that you could take him to Luna, but she's a little bit weak. To be honest, a lot of us are pretty weak except for Telia and, obviously, the mighty Uchinos."

"Take me to her," the pink-coated unicorn smirked when he heard my command.

"Why would the mighty Uchinos want to risk Telia's life by bringing a big scary dragon to see her?" I didn't have time for his nonsense. A little dragon was dying on my back, and an idiot was wasting my time.

"What do you want?" The unicorn's smirk made me want to tear out his throat and watch him choke to death on his own blood.

"What does the mighty Uchinos want, hmm? Allow the mighty Uchinos to think about that for a moment."

_ Kill the son of a bitch right now, you pussy. _

"Well, mister big scary dragon, as you might have guessed, the life of the mighty Uchinos is shit and the mighty Uchinos doesn't have much to lose. The mighty Uchinos wants to die in a very specific way," I had heard rumors about unicorns having very strange fetishes. Apparently, fetishized death wasn't an uncommon thing for unicorns.

"What do you want me to do? Eat you?" The unicorn happily nodded his head. I tried my best to ignore his hardening penis.

"Yes, mister big scary dragon, the mighty Uchinos wants to be eaten alive by a dragon who loves the mighty Uchinos," my cold glare made him turn away from me.

_ Eat this little bastard. _

"Well, if your friend lives, could you at least pretend to love the mighty Uchinos as you eat the mighty Uchinos? Like, would it really be so hard for you to kiss the mighty Uchinos?" I wanted to throw up. This unicorn was insane and in a normal situation I would try to get as far away from him as possible.

But that wasn't a normal situation. I needed to do whatever it took to save the life of the little dragon.

"I'll do whatever you want me to do if my friend livess," the unicorn frowned.

"That isn't fair. Your friend is so fucked he'll probably be dead before you reach Telia," he wasn't wrong, but I didn't want to be reminded of the mortality of the dragon. I needed to remain hopeful that he would survive.

"But, the mighty Uchinos thinks that a small chance of saving him is better than nothing. It's also better than there being no chance of saving him, and that's better than having a flaming unicorn's horn shoved up your poop hole," I really didn't have time to listen to the dumb unicorn.

"What the mighty Uchinos is saying is that following the mighty Uchinos would be preferable to getting a unicorn's horn shoved up your poop hole. So, you might as well follow the mighty Uchinos," the unicorn trotted away with a smile on his face and I followed him. The dragon on my back didn't seem to be getting better, but at least he was alive. If the deity of creation was merciful then there was a small chance that he would survive to see his first sunset.

"Okay, the mighty Uchinos brought you here," I growled at the unicorn and slapped him across his face. My friend was dying, and the little asshole refused to tell me that Telia's home was only three houses away from where I had been talking to him.

"You're a piece of sshit," the unicorn shrugged his shoulders.

"Not a lot of dragons come here, the mighty Uchinos wanted to savour the moment. You're still gonna eat the mighty Uchinos, right?" The only thing that I wanted more than to eat the annoying unicorn was to make sure that my little dragon friend survived.

_ Kill him right now _

I walked up to the wooden door and knocked. I didn't answer the unicorn's question, but I suspected that he was fully aware that I planned on eating him as soon as the little dragon was healed.

It didn't take long for the door to open, and when it did I saw a beautiful young unicorn with a black coat who would eventually become my wife. 

"You are a dragon, from the valley. Why have you come to visit me?" I lowered my body to the floor so that the unicorn could see the injured dragon. The unicorn nodded her head and I felt her magic lift the dragon off of my back.

"Most of his spirit has left his body. It seems like this might be a bit tricky," I heard a groan from the pink-coated unicorn.

"She's always rhyming for some reason. I guess, you can only be important if you're crazy or you can pretend to be interesting," the black-coat shrugged her shoulders.

"You will never be more important than me. It matters little that you think I'm crazy," it bothered me that the two unicorns were arguing while my friend was dying in front of them.

"Telia, pleasse, just ssave his life. He ssaid that you're the only one here who might be able to ssave him," the eyes of the black-coated unicorn scanned the body of the dragon.

_ Kill her. _

"I can save him, leave me alone. In 2 hours please return to my home," before I could respond, I felt her red smoke surround me and I was pushed out of the house. I was alone with the bizarre unicorn, and I really didn't want to be.

"So, let's talk about the mighty Uchinos's reward," I glared at the pink-coated unicorn. He was annoying, but he had recommended that I seek Telia's help, and he had led me to her. He deserved a reward for what he had done.

"I'm a vegetarian," the unicorn smirked.

"That's fine, you can pretend that the mighty Uchinos is a carrot. A big sexy carrot."

\---

"You're so bashful. It's cute, but come on big dragon! The mighty Uchinos is gonna die! The least you can do is kiss the mighty Uchinos," the whole situation seemed so surreal. The mighty Uchinos had managed to convince the dragon to follow the mighty Uchinos to his bedroom, and the mighty Uchinos was sitting on his bed waiting for him to eat the mighty Uchinos. The mighty Uchinos's bum was presented for him, because that's where the mighty Uchinos wanted him to start. The mighty Uchinos wanted him to eat his legs, then work his way to the head of the mighty Uchinos.

"I really don't feel comfortable about thiss," the dragon was such a buzzkill. The mighty Uchinos wanted it, and the mighty Uchinos knew that a part of him wanted it as well. When the mighty Uchinos looked into his eyes the mighty Uchinos saw something dark. The mighty Uchinos saw a dragon who wanted to kill and eat unicorns like the mighty Uchinos.

The mighty Uchinos could only see that dark part of him for a few short moments. Every other time that the mighty Uchinos looked into his eyes the mighty Uchinos saw a broken dragon who was struggling to do what he believed was the correct thing to do.

"Just relax and take the first bite, then just do what feels natural," the mighty Uchinos paused. There was something else that the mighty Uchinos wanted him to do, but it was a bit embarrassing to ask.

Fuck it. He was eating the mighty Uchinos anyway, it didn't matter if the mighty Uchinos felt a little bit embarrassed.

"Can you, umm, call the mighty Uchinos, Precious?" The dragon was silent, which was probably not a good sign.

"Preciouss," the dragon kissed my bum. "Preciouss, I've never done anything like thiss before. I've never kissssed anyone, and I've never had conssenssual ssex. Thiss thing iss jusst weird," Precious didn't dare turn around to look him in the eye. Precious couldn't let him see the blushing face of Precious.

"Erm, well, since you're the lamest dragon in the world, maybe you should start with a kiss. You can eat Precious when you feel a bit more comfortable, or hungry, whichever comes first," the dragon moved away from Precious's back to Precious's front. He looked directly into Precious's eyes, and he smiled at Precious.

Precious couldn't see the dark part of him that wanted to kill Precious, all that Precious saw was a kind-hearted dragon who only wanted to make Precious happy. It didn't matter that Precious was a creepy unicorn with a disgusting fetish, all that mattered was that Precious was a unicorn who wanted something that only he could give Precious.

He kissed Precious as best as he could. Their mouths didn't mesh well together, but it didn't seem to matter to him since he didn't seem to like having their mouths being connected. He mainly seemed to enjoy licking Precious's tongue and face with his unnaturally long tongue.

Precious didn't mind his strange way of kissing. Any way of kissing was a good way of kissing. The only thing that mattered to Precious was that he was the one kissing Precious, because Precious knew that for just a moment Precious was the most important thing in his life.

"Hmm, what are the chances that Precious would find a sexy dragon who's also just as gay as Precious," the dragon momentarily stopped licking Precious's face and he stared at Precious with a strange expression. It felt like he believed that Precious had said the stupidest thing in the world.

"Most valley dragonss are gay," the dragon said to Precious. "Ass far as I know, there are only five female dragonss in the entire colony, and only one of them layss eggss. If we want to have ssex, and we do because there'ss not much elsse to do for fun in the valley, we need to have ssex with maless."

"Ah, that's good to know," the dragon's tongue darted out of his mouth and he placed a quick lick on Precious's cheek. "Precious thinks that it doesn't matter much now, but-" The lips of the dragon covered Precious's mouth. Precious was silenced, but Precious didn't care. It was nice to say nothing and enjoy the feeling of two bodies being connected.

Oryps broke the kiss and smiled seductively at Precious. "You talk too much. There are far better thingss you can usse your mouth for," Precious couldn't help himself from laughing at him. He probably thought that the words sounded so romantic, but when he said them out loud they sounded so dumb, just like him.

"You should probably use your mouth to eat Precious before you say something even stupider."

\---

_ Other unicorns probably taste just as good. You should eat them all. _

My belly was full after consuming the unicorn. I didn't eat all of him because I didn't need to. He died with a big smile on his face as he assured me that I had made him happy when I was halfway through eating his flesh.

_ Everybody needs to die some time. _

His flesh tasted terrible, but the marrow in his bones tasted delicious. I had considered snapping off his leg bones once I had eaten all of the flesh, and feasting on the delicious marrow inside of the bone. I decided against doing that because I knew that my happiness didn't matter, all that mattered was making sure that the unicorn was happy.

As I knocked on the door of Telia's house I wondered how she would react to seeing the blood on my scales. I wasn't going to lie to her about what had happened, but I doubted that she would believe me when I told her that the unicorn had begged me to eat him.

_ You killed him. Are you proud of yourself? _

The door opened, and Telia appeared with the small dragon sleeping on her back. He seemed to be fine, aside from one small detail. There appeared to be a red metal plate covering half of his chest.

"It's cursemetal that I had to use. I can remove it, but I need something from you," the unicorn gently lowered the small dragon to the floor using a red cloud of magic smoke.

"What iss curssemetal, why did you usse it and what do you need from me?" Telia smiled sweetly at me as she placed her hoof on my chest. I wanted to back away from her, but I didn't want to offend her.

_ Pin her to the floor and rape her. _

"Long ago, a dragon named Xnoy attacked The Shard. The metal she attacked became soft, not hard. It could be used by magicians like me. To fix problems, whatever they might be," I noticed that the red metal plate started to glow.

"As you can see, the metal is glowing. That means that the danger is growing. I need a part of your soul, to save his life. If I don't get it, I promise, the dragon will die," Telia probably believed that I would tell her that I wouldn't give her any part of my soul. My soul wasn't precious, and if I could make sure that the small dragon lived, I would gladly give up a lot more than simply my soul.

_ Kill the bitch. _

"Take ass much of my ssoul ass you need, just make ssure that he livess," Telia shook her head.

"Oh naive dragon, if only it were that easy. How much will you sacrifice for this baby?" I was willing to sacrifice anything to save the little dragon. If I needed to die so that he could live, then I would gladly make that sacrifice.

If I were to die, then maybe I wouldn't hear the voices in my head anymore. I also wouldn't have any nightmares.

_ You will never get rid of me. _

"I would die for him, sso kill me if you have to. Do whatever you need to do, and take whatever you want from me. Jusst ssave his life," Telia smirked as she attempted to push me to the ground with her hoof. I was strong enough to remain upright.

"You're so powerful, this baby is weak. Why are you willing to die for the meek," Telia placed her hoof upon my mouth to silence me before I could answer.

"I need to cut you open and remove a part of your soul, then I will take what the dragon needs. Your life will be shortened dramatically, and you will always feel the temptation to do evil deeds. The cursemetal metal will stay inside. It will be with you even after you die," my decision was final, and my resolve never waivered. If I had to set my soul on fire I would do it to save the life of the dragon.

_ You could kill him and not get a piece of metal shoved inside you. _

"Alright, you stupid dragon, get inside and lie down. I'll cut you open and... And, erm, uh, gown?" The unicorn blushed and shook her head.

_ Her rhymes are shit. Kill her. _

"Rhyming all the time iss hard, issn't it? Why do you do it?" The unicorn's blush deepened and she turned her head away from me.

"It's umm, my mother. She was killed when I was just a baby. That's how she talked, and, I guess it's just my way of, erm, I don't know. I just feel like she would appreciate it," the unicorn looked so cute. If I didn't know how powerful she was, or how smart she was, I would have assumed that she was just a nervous teenager.

"I think that sshe would be proud of you," the unicorn nodded her head.

"I know that she's proud of me, and knows what I've done. I hope she's in the Well Of Souls having lots of fun. Dad regretted the terrible things he did to his son. He believed he deserved to die because of what he'd done," hearing her talk about her father made me feel a little bit strange. At that moment, I had no idea who my father was. My mother was loving, but she wasn't a unicorn mother. She didn't teach me how to fly, she didn't teach me how to hunt.

She comforted me when I returned to her cave with blood and semen leaking from my body. She let me sleep in her cave beside her whenever I felt tired, because when I slept beside her I felt safe. When I slept alone in the forest or the cave that I had claimed as my own, I would have terrible nightmares, when I slept beside my mother I didn't have nightmares.

I slept beside her every night for my first month alive, after that I tried to sleep in my cave. I wanted to be independent, I wanted to be strong, but I was never able to get a good sleep without having a nightmare.

Aishiteru, my dear mother, always understood me better than any other dragon. She always wanted me to feel safe and loved. It always hurt me when I neglected my health because I knew that she hated to see me get sick. Whenever I coughed the other dragons assumed that I had a simple cold. Aishiteru was the only one who knew that my coughs were usually a symptom of a much more serious issue.

Part of the reason why she worried was because my father was a snake. My body was far more sensitive to cold temperatures than other dragons because of that. The other part of the reason is because I attempted suicide when I was three months old by overdosing on human pills that I had found during a visit to the city.

_ You should have died, you piece of shit. _

The pills had been kept in a storage building and were only supposed to be used in emergencies by city dragons who had been trained to understand the purpose of each pill. I took as many of the pills as I could carry to my cave, then I ate them all.

I thought that I would die peacefully and then the nightmares would stop, but I didn't die peacefully. Instead, I started vomiting and I didn't stop vomiting until I passed out. When I woke up, Aishiteru's face was staring at me. She had been worried about me, and she brought me to her cave when she saw my lifeless body.

_ You should have killed her. _

She had believed that I had died, and although she was relieved that I was alive, she was mad that I had attempted suicide.

"Oryps, you're supposed to be strong. You can't die like a coward," my head was spinning. All that I had wanted to do was lie down and sleep.

"Mommy, the nightmaress, the voicess, the... It'ss all too much! I just don't want to deal with it anymore!" I cried harder than I had cried since the horrible rape that I had endured when I was just a hatchling. It felt like all of the grief that I had tried to hide was flowing out of my body.

"Oryps, my precious Oryps. I know that you are destined to do great things. I also know how much darkness there is your heart," Aishiteru reached out and gently stroked my wings with the tip of her talon.

_ Kill the whore. _

"My precious Oryps, you are destined to fight the darkness and use your strength to make the weakest of us become the strongest. Before you can fulfill your destiny, you need to battle the darkness within you, and make yourself become truly strong," I tried my best to push away her talon, but she was a lot stronger than I was.

"Mommy, I want to do good thingss, I really do. But, the voicess, the dreamss, it's all too much to handle," tears rolled down my face and illuminated the ground with their pink light.

"Little one, you need to let me help you. There are some battles you can't win by yourself. Everybody needs help sometimes," I shook my head. All that I wanted to do was curl up into a ball and be alone with my thoughts.

_ Kill her, Oryps. Kill the bitch. _

"Mommy, I jusst c-c-can't. It'ss sso hard to think about it, to talk about it. The n-nightmaress, mommy, the voicess. Mommy, th-they're telling me to k-k-kill you!" I hid my face after my confession. I was so sure that she wouldn't want to be around me anymore after hearing that I was constantly being told to kill her.

"My precious Oryps, I love you and I know that you love me. I know that you are a good little dragon who would never do anything to hurt me," her words stung. I knew that inside of my heart there was darkness, and as long as that darkness existed I would never be a truly good dragon.

"Mommy, I jusst wanna be good. I want you to be proud of me and I-I-I, I feel like ass long ass I hear thesse voicess, ass long ass I have thesse nightmaress and ass long ass I ssleep besside you like a pathetic hatchling you'll never be proud of me," my mother scooped me up and gently lifted my body up to her face. I was able to stare directly into her massive eyes and see every contour of her smiling face.

"Oryps, I'm more proud of you than I am of any of my other children. I know that you'll continue to make me proud throughout your life, and I'm excited to see all of the wonderful things you will do," she was trying to make me feel better, but it wasn't working.

_ Kill her. _

"Mommy, what have I done that would make you sso proud?" Aishiteru smiled at me, and she licked my face lightly with her long tongue.

"Oryps, my beautiful baby. You just confessed your inner demons and told the strongest dragon in the colony that there's a voice in your head telling you to kill her. You're already much braver than you realize you are, and so much stronger than you know. I wish that you could see yourself the way that I see you."

"Stop thinking about your past. I need to work, right now, fast," I shook my head. Whenever mothers were mentioned I tended to think about my beloved mother.

"Ssorry," I half-heartedly apologized." "Sso, are you ready to take my ssoul or whatever?" Telia nodded her head.

"If you were awake, you'd scream and weep. I'm sorry, but you need to sleep," my eyes widened in terror. I could handle pain, but I couldn't handle the nightmares when I would fall asleep.

"No! Pleasse, jusst-" The black unicorn raised her hoof and I could feel my vision begin to fade to black.

"Don't you worry, don't you fight. Every little thing will be alright."

\---

"You will not hurt him!" The whimpering furry hatchling stood behind me and tended to the wounds he had already received. A group of dragons stood in front of me with their teeth bared and their talons ready to strike.

"That fucking dragon is nothing but an embarrassment! We need to kill it!" I shook my head and bared my own teeth. I wasn't as skilled in combat or as strong as those much bigger dragons, but I knew that I would be able to put up a decent fight. I would be able to protect the furry dragon if I fought hard enough.

"Lissten to me! The sstrong need to help the weak become sstrong! If we kill him becausse of our inssecuritiess, we're admitting that we are weak!" The back legs of the leader of the group of dragons bent slightly. He was about to pounce and I needed to be ready for his attack if I wanted to save the life of the furry dragon.

"This sheepfucker needs to fucking die!" The dragon leapt towards me and I leapt up to counter his attack. My talons penetrated his belly and I heard him cry out in pain as he fell to the ground.

_ Finish him, you pussy! _

I yanked my talons from the flesh of the dragon. He was injured, but I knew that he would recover. I hadn't pierced any vital organs. I had been careful and precise with my strike, which was something that I took pride in. Most dragons wouldn't think about their strikes when they attacked.

"Oryps. Y-you piece of s-shit momma's b-baby! You made me bleed!" I refused to be intimidated by him or his menacing friends. As long as the furry dragon needed my help I would continue to defend him. I would fight thousands of demons and crawl through a lake of fire to save his life.

"Momma isn't around to protect her momma's baby," one of the dragons sneered. "When we're done with you, you're gonna wish that you never made Pyre bleed," when I was done with them, they would be wishing that they never hurt the furry dragon. I didn't think that I could defeat them all, but I was sure that I could defeat a couple of them.

"Sstay away from my friend," I tried my best to sound intimidating. The other dragons were bigger than me and more experienced in combat. Even though my mother had often told me how strong I was, and what a wonderful destiny I had, at that moment I wasn't strong. I was just a baby dragon trying to protect a hatchling from a group of much larger dragons.

I heard the sound of fluid falling on the ground. I tried my best to keep my composure as the smell of urine drifted towards my nostrils.

"S-sorry. Ay'm a bit nervous," as much as I wanted to comfort the nervous dragon, I knew that I couldn't turn my back on the bigger dragons.

_ Kill the furry bastard. _

"Why are you willing to die for this furry bitch?" One of the dragons sneered. "Look at him, he's an embarrassment! He's fucking pissing on the fucking ground!" I continued to stand my ground and wait for them to attack. It would be easier to counter their attacks than to attack them myself, and they were fully aware of that. I had the advantage, not them. They needed to attack if they wanted to kill the hatchling, I needed to counter their attacks to protect him.

"I'm not moving," I growled at the dragons and bared my teeth. The dragons sneered at me and prepared to pounce, which was exactly what I wanted. I knew that I had to do whatever it took to defend the weak dragon.

The first dragon pounced, and I took care of him easily by puncturing his ankle. As he lied on the ground nursing his wound I attacked him a second time. A quick strike to his back left him wounded, and he silently admitted defeat as he tended to his injuries. Killing the furry dragon wasn't worth suffering far more serious injuries.

The other two dragons were more dangerous. They tried to attack the furry dragon while I was injuring their friend. One of them was already fairly close to the furry dragon, while the other lagged just behind his friend.

I prioritized my attacks. The first strike was aimed at a dragon's wings, the most valued limb of a fully grown dragon. My second strike was aimed at the belly of the other dragon. Both of my attacks hit their targets.

The first attack permanently crippled the dragon, and as he collapsed on the ground he knew that he had made a huge mistake. His right wing was broken beyond repair, and the pain he felt caused him to collapse on the ground.

The other dragon wasn't meant to be crippled. I just twisted my talons into a fist and knocked the air out of his stomach. He laid on the ground gasping for breath and looking at me with eyes filled with hate.

All four dragons had been incapacitated. I knew that I had to get the furry dragon somewhere safe before they recovered.

"Come on, we need to go," I said to the furry dragon who still seemed to be frightened.

"Yes Oryps, you need to go. Let us take care of the freak," the low-pitched voice of the dragon was supposed to intimidate me, but it galvanized me. I turned to face the dragon that had spoken and I was surprised to see a group of around 20 dragons staring at the furry dragon as though he was a delicious piece of meat.

"You'll need to break every bone in my body if you want to hurt him," the biggest dragon in the group smirked at me. He wasn't intimidated by me, and I wasn't intimidated by him. The only advantage that I had was that he underestimated what I could, and would, do to defend the little dragon.

"Sstay behind me. Make ssure that I'm alwayss between you and them," I instructed the furry dragon. As I saw the dragons charge towards me I had doubts as to whether or not I would survive the assault and protect the young dragon.

_ Kill them all, you pussy. _

That was all the encouragement that I needed.

\---

"That looks really bad," my mother's saliva was still fresh on my wounds. The worst of my injuries, the one that my furry friend was referring to, was a large gash on my back. Thankfully, my wings were fine, but I wouldn't be able to walk properly for a while. I doubted that my spine would ever fully heal, but I silently thanked the deity of creation because I knew that I could have been in a much worse state after the battle.

"I'm not going to lie to you, there issn't a ssingle part of my body that doessn't hurt." I smiled at the furry dragon. "But it wass worth it becausse you ssurvived."

"But for how long?" The furry dragon whimpered. "Ya're in no position ta protect me. What if they try again?" My mother placed her extremely large talons on the ground beside the furry dragon.

"You can stay with me until you can protect yourself," my mother said to the furry dragon. The young dragon growled at my mother, and I fought against every instinct that I had to tell him not to disrespect her.

_ Kill the furry bastard. _

"Why didn't ya say that before ay walked outside? Ya didn't care if ay lived or died a couple hours ago, and now you're letting me stay with ya?" Aishiteru nodded her head.

"When you were born, you were just another furry dragon that would be slaughtered by my other children. Now, you're the furry dragon that my pristine purple prince risked his life to protect," this explanation did not seem to satisfy my new friend.

"So ay only matter to ya if your favourite son cares about me?" Unfortunately, my mother nodded her head. "Great, and what if he had died protecting me?"

"Then you would have been the furry dragon that my pristine purple prince died protecting," the furry dragon sighed and he ran his talons along a particularly large gash on my leg. It wasn't as serious an injury as the one on my back, but it still hurt a lot.

"Oi, ay guess we're connected now, whether ay like it or not. These scars will stay with ya forever, just like me," I smiled at my new friend and I reached out to gently stroke his brown fur. It was soft, and it reminded me of the fur of a rabbit in the forest.

"Do ya like it?" The dragon smiled. For a moment we stared into each other's eyes and we felt like we understood each other better than any two dragons had ever understood each other. We were two young dragons who had seen how bad dragons could be if they allowed themselves to be controlled by their prejudices and selfish desires. We were determined to be different from those wicked dragons.

We were prepared to support each other for the rest of our lives, through the harshest battles or the quietest moments of relaxation. We would swim in the ocean, climb trees, and laugh with each other, but we would also face many hardships. I liked to think that we were both fully aware that we would eventually face zombies, shapechangers and rogue snakes in battle.

"Yess, I do."

\---

I woke up in my cave with sweat covering my body. Ekips was asleep, thankfully. He knew about my nightmares and he always made such a fuss when I woke up after a nightmare. I never wanted him to worry about me.

"Bad dream?" I didn't turn my head to face the furry dragon who had entered my cave.

"They've been pretty bad lately. Not that they've ever not been bad," I heard the dragon's footsteps on the hard ground as he walked towards me.

"Yeah, ay get that. Ay've been having a dream where ay'm a kangaroo's baby and my mom tosses me at a wolf, or a bear, or something while she runs off. That kinda sucks," Sheepfucka was never great at comforting me after a nightmare.

"What happens in your dreams, bud? Is it worse than being eaten alive by a wolf after your momma throws ya away?" I shook my head. I never liked to talk about my nightmares, and Sheepfucka knew that. He didn't expect me to talk to him about my childhood trauma, but he always hoped that eventually I would talk to him and he could help me heal.

"Oryps, buddy, ay don't want ta keep watching ya destroy yourself. Ya need ta let me help ya," the furry dragon meant well, and I didn't want to push him away. Talking to anyone about my nightmares, even my best friend, was something that I couldn't do.

"Ssheep, I'm ssorry, but I jusst can't. Not right now," the furry dragon was now standing directly in front of me and I could see his concerned expression which only made me feel guiltier. I never liked appearing weak in front of him.

"Ya don't have ta talk right now, bud, but someday ya need ta talk to me about this. Ay can wait forever. Ay'm like one of your scars, bud. Ay'll be with ya until ya die," Sheepfucka traced his talons along his favorite of my many scars, the large one on my leg.

"Oryps, have ya ever had a wet dream?" I shook my head. "Ya should have one some day, they're pretty fun. As soon as ya stop having nightmares, ya can start having wet dreams. Won't that be great?" Comments like that were one of the reasons why I valued Sheepfucka as a friend. Aishiteru, Ambrosia, Ekips and Telia would never say anything like that to me.

"If you ssay sso," I said to my friend. My eyes were heavy and I knew that I would fall asleep soon. Sheepfucka must have known how tired I was as well because he started to walk away. I guessed that my drooping eyes were a pretty obvious way to tell that I was tired.

"Hey, Ssheep. Thanks for, well, everything. It meanss a lot," Sheepfucka grunted as his way of acknowledging me.

"Yeah, sure bud, that's what friends are for."


	8. The Book Of Oryps: Chapter 2 - Ambrosia

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope that some people are reading this story, and it kind of upsets me that I haven't had the motivation to update it. Honestly, I've been smoking pretty heavily the past few days because it makes me feel better, and when I stop the bad feelings feel like they're suffocating me. I think I just need validation, I guess, at least more than I'm getting, anyway. This probably isn't the best place for that, honestly.
> 
> Anyways, here's another chapter in the story where Oryps is actually from. I'm hesitant about posting the actual first chapter because the sex scene in it will probably turn a lot of people off. But, like, if people want to read the sex scene, maybe I'll post it for them.

**Chapter 2: Ambrosia**

My name was Ambrosia. The scales that covered my body were a perfect shade of ivory. My absolutely perfect wings were colored royal purple, which was pretty wonderful. The great deity blessed me with a perfectly colored body and trusted me to maintain my beauty for my entire life. The deity gave me a wonderful gift, and I made sure to show my appreciation by never letting the kindness of my creator go to waste.

I had agreed to become the mate of the queen of my precious little colony. Dragon queens didn't usually choose a mate, but I was so beautiful, charming, and enjoyable to be around that the dragon queen decided that she would choose me as her mate regardless of what the other dragons in our colony would think. How wonderful was that?

My mate truly was unique, in more ways than just her size. She had scars covering her entire body, but she had never told me how she got them. To be honest, I never wanted to know how she got the scars. The thought of someone actually hurting my mate with their talons or something much worse made me angry.

Unique, that was such a wonderful word that I enjoyed using in casual conversation. It was such a fun word to say, along with words like delicate, dismayed, and flabbergasted. The ability to communicate using such wonderful words was what truly made us dragons special in a savage and uncivilized world.

I learned to ignore almost every scar on my mate's body, but the one scar that I had never been able to completely ignore was the large one above her right eye that extended a little bit past her forehead. She had never told me about the origin of that scar. Who would possibly want to hurt such a kind and sweet dragon like my mate?

My dragon queen only left her cave at night to hunt for food, which meant that in a perfect world I could have her all to myself every day. In reality, I was a busy dragon, so I rarely had time to spend with my beloved dragon queen.

I taught the younger generation of dragons valuable lessons in the school area that the dragons in our colony set up in our lovely little valley. I was quite obviously the smartest dragon in our colony, so it was only logical that I was selected as the dragon who would teach the younger dragons every useful skill, and every useful piece of information they would need to know.

The dragons in our colony were so civilized compared to the savages in the other dragon colonies. I had heard absolutely repugnant stories of dragon colonies where cannibalism was a common practice. Old dragons were eaten by young dragons when they became too weak to hunt for food. It absolutely sickened me that any dragon would ever resort to cannibalizing the flesh of another dragon, no matter what their justification might have been for doing so..

Other dragon colonies were known to have the members of their colonies engage in an orgy on a nightly basis. Every dragon, including the youngest hatchlings, were encouraged to participate in these orgies, and a number of hatchlings had been known to have died while participating against their will. Those barbaric practices simply couldn't be allowed to exist in civilized dragon colonies.

Fortunately, not all dragon colonies were as barbaric as others. I had traveled to one of the cities, and I had seen how the dragons lived in the buildings left behind by humans once they all became extinct.

In those cities, some dragon colonies had found a way to use magic to power the machines left behind. Those dragon colonies cooked food in the buildings, they watched movies in the buildings, and they even slept in the buildings. It amazed me how civilized and elegant these dragons had looked as they relaxed in their little spaces in the skyscrapers watching movies left behind by the humans.

I tried to join one of those colonies, but unfortunately, I discovered that I was too big to fit inside the small spaces in the skyscrapers.

It was a terrible twist of fate. Until that moment I was satisfied with my life in the valley. However, once I had seen a glimpse into a more civilized world with more civilized dragons, I became a little bit unsatisfied with my life.

For a month I would return to the skyscrapers every night and watch the dragons as they either slept or went about their nightly rituals, depending on how late or how early I was able to travel to the city. I saw dragons lying in what I assumed was a comfortable position on the old sofas in the buildings while they watched movies on their television screens.

Why couldn't I be allowed to sit on a comfortable couch and watch a movie? The closest thing that I got to comfort was lying on the grass in our valley. The closest thing that I got to entertainment was watching two dragons have sex. It made me upset that the life that I desired was within my reach, but I was born too large to be able to take part in any aspect of life in those skyscrapers. I was cursed to only be able to look in through the window.

Of course, some dragons didn't like seeing me look at them through their window, and they would attempt to cover the window with a curtain. It was foolish of them to do so because even though I was a much more civilized dragon than most other dragons, I was still big enough and powerful enough to do some damage.

I would break the window and tear out the curtains so that I could continue to watch the dragons as they did whatever they did in their little spaces inside the skyscrapers. Once I did that, they would cower in fear in their little spaces as I stood in front of them. I hated seeing those tiny dragons stare at me as though I were a beast as terrifying as the savage dragons from the less civilized colonies.

There was a small group of three dragons living in one of the small spaces who didn't fear me. I watched them through the window, and they allowed me to do so. They were friendly, and they would smile at me when I visited them while they watched a movie.

The humans must have been very interesting creatures when they were alive. They built enormous structures to use as shelter instead of simply sleeping in an open field or inside a cave. Their movies seemed to provide a glimpse into what their lives were like, and they were incredibly interesting.

Apparently, humans used to drive around in machines made out of metal that they referred to as cars. These machines would be used to travel through the large cities that they constructed.

I remembered thinking that the machines they created weren't nearly as effective at traveling great distances as the magnificent wings of a dragon. But then, I watched a movie where I saw that the humans created machines called airplanes which could fly through the sky as fast as a fully grown dragon.

It was no wonder that a species as intelligent and adaptable as humans were able to become the dominant species on the planet. I liked to believe that somehow dragons caused the extinction of humans because dragons were the superior species.

Humans were intelligent hairless monkeys who would have never survived a single cold winter if they hadn't learned to cover themselves with the fur of animals. Dragons never needed to cover their bodies, they survived the cold nights by cuddling for warmth with their friends and their mates. Dragons never needed to create or use the tools created by humans to survive, since dragons were strong enough without tools to survive and thrive in the harsh world.

The humans were far more civilized than dragons, that was the main aspect of humans that I envied. Humans used their tools and their intelligence to make life so easy for themselves that they could devote quite a bit of time and energy to leisure activities. Dragons spent every day searching for food, and they spent every night cuddling each other for warmth. Humans would presumably spend every moment they weren't trying to survive having fun and watching movies.

It would have made me extremely happy to be able to spend a night watching movies while lying on a couch with my beloved queen. Alas, I was born as a dragon who was destined to be too large to fit into a human dwelling, and my lovely dragon queen was much larger than I was. The size difference between us often made things a bit complicated.

The dragon queen couldn't kiss me in the normal way that dragons kissed. When she wanted to kiss me, she would simply extend her long tongue and smear my face with her saliva. I thought that it was disgusting when she did that, and when she first started licking my face to show her affections towards me I would get angry at her. I learned to tolerate her disgusting version of a kiss because I knew that she only did it to show her affection towards me. I might have done the same to her if the situation was reversed, and I was the massive dragon in the relationship.

The body of my mate never ceased to amaze me, and it seemed as though every time I explored her body I would always find something new. Oddly enough, even though she had a massive vagina that went mostly unused, she had at least 20 smaller vaginas which the comparatively small dragons in our colony would use to impregnate her. It was always difficult to contain my jealousy whenever I saw the male dragons pile on top of her and violate her.

The male dragons looked like tiny mosquitoes sticking their tiny needle-like appendages into the queen when they bred her. The dragon queen never displayed any signs that she enjoyed the numerous males impregnating her. As a matter of fact, I didn't think that she experienced any pleasure from the experience at all. Sometimes I thought that she fell asleep when the males fulfilled their obligation to the colony, and she would wake up hours after the last male had left the cave.

As a female dragon, I knew what female dragons liked, and I was able to regularly satisfy the dragon queen in ways that dozens of male dragons never could.

The dragon queen always slept after she had eaten the large amount of food she needed to sustain herself. I didn't know where she travelled to get her food, but I believed that it might have been somewhere far away.

I was harvesting some vegetables from the garden near one of the entrances to the cave that me and the queen shared. I had never enjoyed eating the flesh of an animal, so I had always chosen to eat vegetables and fruits whenever it was possible. When I was younger it was so much easier to fill myself up with the berries I could gather from the forest in our valley. However, when I got older, I found that I needed to eat a lot more fruits and vegetables to survive.

If I didn't have a garden that provided me with a lot of fruits and vegetables, I didn't think that I would have been able to sustain myself. I might have had to do the unthinkable and eat the flesh of a helpless animal to fill my stomach.

For a while, I was the only vegetarian dragon in the colony, but that changed when Oryps was born.

I loved Oryps more than any other dragon with the exception of the queen. Me and him had always been as close as dragons could be to each other without being mates. When he was born he hunted for food so that the other hatchlings wouldn't need to. He brought food to the cave for them to eat once they had hatched from their eggs. No other dragon had ever done anything like that in the history of our colony.

The kindness, strength, and intelligence of the hatchling impressed both me and the queen. I was only three years old at the time, and I was nervous about approaching the dragon to talk with him. Luckily for me, I didn't have to approach him.

One day, when I was in the forest, Oryps appeared next to me while I was harvesting some tasty red berries from a thorny bush. Oryps started to talk to me while he was happily snacking on the red berries.

"What'ss your name?" He asked me in between mouthfuls of berries. I told him that my name was Ambrosia, and I also commented on how he was the only other dragon I had ever seen who enjoyed the taste of red berries. He smiled at me, and I giggled when I saw the red juices from the berries he had eaten coating his teeth.

"I prefer the blood of berriess to the blood of animalss," Oryps explained to me. "You can eat ass many berriess ass you want and they will alwayss grow back. When you tear off a rabbit'ss arm, it will never grow back.".

It astounded me how intelligent and mature a dragon who was barely a month old could be. At that moment I knew that Oryps was special, and I also knew that I wanted to be his friend. I wanted to spend as much time with him as possible.

So, after our chat had finished, we agreed to meet each other the next day in the forest for a meal and a nice chat. Then we agreed to meet each other again the day after that. Almost every night until the day I died, we would meet each other to eat our vegetarian dinner and chat with each other.

I had harvested some tomatoes, some potatoes, and some carrots. I felt my stomach growling in anticipation of the delicious vegetarian meal that I was about to eat. But, I knew that I needed to wait before I could enjoy the feast. I promised myself that I would always wait for Oryps to arrive at the cave before I ate my meal.

I didn't have to wait long because Oryps was the most dependable and punctual dragon in the entire colony. I looked up and I saw him gliding towards me with an armful of potatoes and berries. He smiled at me when he landed and I returned the smile with a smile of my own.

"Good evening Ambrossia, you're jusst ass beautiful ass ever. I hope that the queen appreciatess how lucky she iss," I blushed and bashfully turned my head away from him while partially covering my face.

"You always say the sweetest things, baby," I said to the handsome purple dragon. I preferred female dragons to male dragons, but I had always been aware that Oryps was a very beautiful male dragon with excellent manners, and a heart of gold. 

If Oryps had been a female dragon I'm sure we would have been mates, mainly because if Oryps was female I wouldn't accept anyone else as a mate, and I wouldn't allow her to choose another mate.

Oryps smiled sweetly as he walked towards me. Once he was close enough he started to nuzzle my neck. I leaned into his touch and I nuzzled him as well. For a few moments, we stayed like that, with our bodies so close to one another that we felt as though we were physically connected to each other.

But something had to ruin the moment, and that something was my stomach growling. I silently cursed my stomach for ruining the calm moment between me and my best friend before I moved slowly away from him and picked up a tomato.

"I apologize for that, baby. I haven't eaten all day, baby," I bit into the tomato. Oryps nodded in understanding before he picked up a handful of berries and started eating his vegetarian meal.

I watched him chew his berries as I ate my tomatoes. His favorite food had always been the red berries that grew in the forest. Almost every night that I had known him I had seen him color his perfect white teeth with the red pigment of the berries

"Sso," Oryps spoke after a minute or two of eating his berries. "How iss our lovely large lady doing?" Oryps used his nickname for the queen, and I couldn't help myself from giggling a little bit when I heard it.

I once asked Oryps why he never came up with a nickname for me. "No nickname would ssound ass nice or be ass ssuitable for you ass Ambrossia," was his response.

That had been the most romantic thing that anyone had ever said to me. Even the queen, my mate, had never said anything to me that was even half as romantic as that. I knew that she loved me, but I wished that she would tell me that she loved me more often than she did. Oryps never had a problem letting me know how much he cared about me, so why did the queen have trouble telling me how much she cared?

"My darling queen is fine, baby. I'm making sure that she continues to stay happy and healthy for many years to come, baby. Thank you for asking, baby," I smiled at my friend during a break between mouthfuls of delicious vegetarian food. Oryps nodded his head and continued to eat his beloved berries.

We ate our meal in silence for a few moments before I noticed a very familiar sight. The eyelids of my friend appeared to droop, and he stopped eating for a couple of seconds as he yawned. I sighed and stopped eating as I braced myself for what would happen next.

Oryps closed his eyes and his body immediately went limp. Like always, I reached out and caught his head before it landed on the ground. Oryps had passed out, yet again, and I would need to watch over him as he slept.

I adjusted my body so that I was sitting cross-legged and I maneuvered his head so that it was lying comfortably within my legs. I had become so used to this happening that my muscles seemed to go through the whole process as if by instinct.

Once I had become comfortable and the head of my friend was cradled comfortably I started to absent-mindedly stroke the horn on top of his head. Oryps smiled as I stroked his horn and I smiled back even though I knew that he was completely unaware of what was happening. He was probably dreaming about saving sexy dragon princesses from wicked kishunimaras and being rewarded with their tender kisses all over his body.

I planted a short kiss on my friend's forehead and I waited for the two other inevitable things that seemed to happen regularly when Oryps passed out during our nightly meal.

"Ambrosia, my favorite dragoness," I smiled when I heard the majestic voice of my mate and I turned my head to greet her.

"Hello, baby, did you enjoy your nap?" I said to my beloved dragon queen. She looked at me with a radiant grin on her face that seemed to shine light into my soul and momentarily make life a little bit better. Seeing such a gigantic and powerful creature smile so sweetly was a pleasure that I didn't think that I could ever tire of.

"Of course I had a wonderful nap, my precious princess, as long as I know that you are safe from harm I can sleep peacefully," my beloved dragon queen showcased her perfect teeth by smiling briefly during every pause between her words. It was amazing to think about how every single tooth in her perfectly gorgeous mouth was larger than my talons.

"I always know that you're safe because you have our pristine purple prince watching over you," I could feel my body tense slightly as I felt a wave of jealousy flow through my body. 

Why did Oryps have a nickname for her and not a nickname for me? Why did my mate have a nickname for Oryps and not one for me? Was I the least important dragon in the relationship? Was I the only dragon who was undeserving of a nickname?

Oryps said that he never referred to me using a nickname because my normal name suited me perfectly. Perhaps my mate had a similar reason for not referring to me using a nickname.

Yes, that was it. She loved me for who I was, and she refused to refer to me by any other name because my name was a part of me. My name was perfect because of the sheer fact that it was my name. It was the name that she gave me when I hatched from the egg that she laid. But, she also named Oryps, and she still had a nickname for him.

"Are you alright, my love? You seem a little distracted," I heard the voice of my beloved mate and I immediately returned to the real world after a brief moment where I was lost in thought. Sometimes when I thought about something I would stop paying attention to the creatures and events directly in front of me.

"I'm alright, baby," my mate didn't seem convinced. I saw her talon travel towards me, and before I had time to react I felt her one of her talons gently pressing on my forehead.

"You feel a little bit cold. You should come inside before you get sick," I felt the talon leave my forehead after she had finished speaking. For some reason my mate always worried about me possibly getting sick, and she always suggested that I made sure that I stayed warm at all times so that I didn't get sick.

"I won't get sick as long as our pristine purple prince is with me, baby," I pointed to the dragon who was fast asleep with his head cradled within my lap. The dragon queen frowned, and I felt my heart flutter as I considered the possibility that she was jealous of Oryps for being so close to me.

"I really hope that you two don't catch a cold. I don't want my two favorite little dragons to get sick," I smiled widely and nodded my head when I realized that she had spoken to me with the exact same tone that mothers in human films used when they spoke to their children.

My precious mate was acting like a fussy mother making sure that her two lovely children didn't get sick due to their careless actions. I felt as though I extracted far too much joy at the idea of my mate acting like a caring human mother instead of the regal dragon mother that she was.

Human mothers seemed to take care of their children in many different ways from the time that a human was born to the time that they died. The dragon queens would lay the eggs and incubate them, but that was the extent of the motherly care that a dragon queen would provide. Once a dragon hatched from its egg it would be taken care of by the colony, and the dragon queen might never see it again.

"You don't need to worry about either of us, mother," the smile on my face remained in place. "We're big dragons who know how to take care of ourselves, baby."

My mate looked at me with a quizzical expression, and I gasped a little when I realized that I had accidentally referred to her as my mother. It was technically true, but the word was from the language and society of the long-dead humans, not dragons.

"Mother," she said the word as slowly as she possibly could. It felt like she was swirling the syllables around in her mouth, savoring both syllables as though they were the sweetest syllables in the entire world.

"You've never called me mother before," I swallowed and held my breath. I wasn't sure where the conversation was heading, and I wasn't sure if she was responding positively or negatively to what I had said to her.

I didn't usually look at her as a mother. She was my mate and I loved her like other dragons loved their mates. The fact that she was my mother and my queen was something that hung over our relationship but usually never became an issue.

"I, er, I uh, don't know what to-" I felt her long tongue cover my face and I squirmed as I felt the wet appendage coat my face with saliva. As quickly as it appeared on my face, it disappeared back into her mouth and she smiled at me.

"My love, you make me so happy every day and every night. I hope that you never stop being who you are," I smiled at her, despite the fact that I was a little bit irritated that my face was covered with saliva and I knew that I would need to bathe soon.

"Who am I, baby?" I asked my beloved mate. I was expecting the sappiest answer possible from her, and I hoped that she would fully meet my expectations.

"You are my mate and my one true love," I blushed heavily and my mate smiled at me. She extended her tongue and quickly licked my cheek before she started walking back into the large cave that we both shared.

"Mushball, baby," I whispered to myself once my mate was out of sight.

"Oi!" I hated the sound of that voice. "What do you want, Sheepfucka baby?" I knew that it was the dragon who was covered with brown fur without even turning my head to face him. I heard Sheepfucka chuckle as he moved towards me.

"Is the little duchess a bit too ornery? Has the queen been depriving ya of sleep?" I groaned and continued to refuse to face the rude furry dragon.

"You don't even know what that word means, baby," I hoped that my tone of voice expressed my disdain for the furry dragon. We were always bickering with each other, and if Sheepfucka wasn't a close friend of Oryps I doubt I would have any conversations with him at all.

"Of course ay understand," Sheepfucka said with a smug tone of voice. "But ay don't need ta explain it ta ya. Ay need ya ta wake Oryps up," Sheepfucka explained. "A creature needs his help." 

"Where iss thiss creature?" Our conversation had awoken the sleeping dragon in my lap. Or, maybe, Oryps was only pretending to be asleep. He did that sometimes so that his friends, like me, didn't worry about him.

"How long have you been awake, baby?" I asked Oryps as a blush appeared on my face. I hoped that he hadn't heard me call my mate a mushball

"I heard you call the queen a musshball," I sighed. As much as I loved Oryps, I didn't want him to be a witness to a private conversation between me and my mate. Some things were meant to be kept private, even from close friends.

"Oi, Oryps, we don't have time for this. A creature needs ya," I growled at the rude furry dragon who had interrupted the conversation between me and Oryps for his own selfish reasons.

"It's a magic turtle with a colorful shell living in the woods," Sheepfucka explained to us. "It lost its legs somehow so it can't move," Sheepfucka continued to explain the situation and I rolled my eyes. Why would Sheepfucka care about a single crippled animal living in a valley of carnivorous dragons?

"I wassn't aware that there were any rainbow turtless living in the foresst," Oryps said as he sleepily lifted his head from my lap and started moving away from me. He paused to stretch and I was able to admire every single muscle in his body as they tightened and relaxed in front of me.

"The forest is special, ay guess. How many other places do ya know of with a dragon like me?" Oryps smiled as he walked towards the brown furry dragon.

"Are you ssaying that the foresst iss sspecial jusst becausse you live there?" I continued to refuse to face the furry dragon who I disliked, so I didn't know if his face contorted in response to the question his friend had asked. However, based on what I knew about Sheepfucka, I could assume that he smirked at Oryps.

"Of course ay am! Y'all know how special ay am!" I sighed loudly enough for him to hear me, and Oryps smirked at his friend.

"I agree. You are definitely the mosst sspecial dragon in thiss entire colony," Oryps spoke using the most condescending tone I had ever heard him use. Considering how often he spoke to Ekips using his special inimitable tone, that was oddly impressive.

Well, perhaps impressive wasn't the correct word to use. I might have been able to think of a better word to use if I had a little more time to think of one, or if I cared enough to describe my opinion on the tone Oryps used to good-naturedly mock his friend.

"Ya say that like it's a bad thing," Sheepfucka probably had a stupid grin on his face. I hated that dumb expression he used when he thought he was being funny, because he was never funny, he was just stupid. He would never be anything more than a stupid outcast clinging to Oryps because he was the only dragon willing to be his friend.

Dragons were never meant to have fur, so it was unnatural that Sheepfucka was born covered in brown fur instead of the scales that other dragons were born with. The dragon queen didn't want to kill him, and Oryps didn't want him to die, but every other dragon in the colony, including me, wanted him to die.

It was embarrassing for a dragon colony to have a furry dragon. A furry dragon was nothing more than a defective dragon, and the fact that a dragon colony could possibly produce a defective dragon meant that there was something seriously wrong with the dragons in the colony. Therefore, every defective dragon needed to be killed to prevent more defective dragons from being born.

Oryps felt differently, which was why he saved both Ekips and Sheepfucka from being executed. He claimed that if the colony executed the defective dragons they were making a statement that the colony was weak because the dragons in the colony were showcasing a clear weakness, insecurity. He believed that a dragon colony would be viewed by other colonies as being strong if they allowed the weakest among them to survive and thrive within the colony.

I disagreed with Oryps on the issue, but I valued his friendship far too much to end my friendship with him based on a simple disagreement. If Oryps wanted to spend the rest of his life babysitting Ekips, then he could do so. But I wished that he understood that there were far better uses of his time than keeping the weak dragon alive.

"Ssheepfucka, nothing about you could ever be bad, except for your-" Oryps paused for a moment and covered his mouth with his talons. His sneeze was partially muffled by his talons, but since it was loud enough for me to hear I assumed that my mate could hear it from inside the cave.

"Oryps! Are you alright?" I heard my mate call. I sighed and I waited for the inevitable situation that would occur. My mate would fuss over our health and claim that we should spend the day inside of her comfortable cave, so that we could recover from the minor illness she thought that we were afflicted by.

Oryps would claim that he either wasn't sick, or that he was sick and that the wellbeing of whatever creature he planned on helping that day was more important than his own wellbeing. My mate would then politely tell him to return to her cave after he was finished with his daily good deed.

As much as I was tired of the predictable situation that seemed to occur on a regular basis, I would admit that I was worried about the health of my friend. He didn't sleep very often, so most of the time he was very tired. He had been walking much more slowly, he had been getting sick more often, and sometimes he would cough up blood when we were talking during our nightly meal.

If Oryps were any other dragon I would be more worried about him, but Oryps was special. Even if he coughed up blood I know I shouldn't worry about him because he was stronger than other dragons. He could handle any illness, he could defeat any foe, and he could stay awake for weeks at a time. I didn't need to worry about him, and I didn't want to worry about him. I knew that as long as I lived he would be protecting the sapient creatures in our valley.

The ground started to shake as my mate walked to the entrance of the cave. I smiled as I felt every one of her footsteps shake the ground. Sometimes I forgot how big and powerful my mate actually was, and it was nice to be reminded of how lucky I was that she chose to be my mate.

"Oryps, are you alright? You can stay in my cave with me today if you feel sick. I'll take care of you," I growled a little bit out of jealousy after hearing her words. As much as I loved her and I loved Oryps, I'd never understood why my mate seemed to value the health of Oryps over my health. If Oryps died she would lose a friend, if I died she would lose her mate. Why did it seem like it mattered more to her if Oryps died than if I died?

"I'm fine," Oryps sniffled and wiped his nose. "There'ss a rainbow turtle that needss my help. I assssume that you know ass well ass I do why I need to help her."

"Actually, ay think it's a dude," I shot the furry dragon a dirty look after he inserted himself into the conversation. If my mate cared about me as much as she cared about Oryps that disgusting furry creature would have been chastised for his disrespectful attitude towards me.

The dragon queen smiled warmly at Oryps as her talons started traveling towards him. One of her talons was pressed against his forehead, while another talon was lightly stroking his belly. Oryps smiled as he felt the talons of my mate touching his body, and as jealous as I was, I contented myself with the knowledge that the touch of the queen was a pleasure I had enjoyed every night that Oryps only occasionally got to experience.

"It feels like you have a fever," Oryps seemed to completely ignore the diagnosis my mate had given him. He refused to even consider the possibility of not helping the turtle in the forest.

"Don't worry about me, I jusst have a bit of a cold. I'll be fine," Oryps seemed to be as oblivious to my jealousy as my own mate. I considered faking a sneeze to get her to worry about me as well, but instead, I attempted to cool down my temper and think rationally about the situation. My mate cared about the health of Oryps, he was as much her friend as he was mine. I shouldn't have gotten so jealous whenever she showed him that she cared about him.

My mate and Oryps locked eyes for a few minutes, and the atmosphere felt a little bit tense. I felt as though the two dragons were sharing a personal moment, and that I was nothing more than a witness.

I didn't like being simply a witness to anything, but that seemed to be my role most of the time. I was always a witness to the wonderfully lethargic lifestyles of the tiny dragons living in their towers, and I would never be able to participate in any part of their lives in the structures. I would never be able to lounge on a sofa watching a movie while cuddling with my mate, and it wasn't fair. Why was I forced to live like a savage just because I was a little bit too large?

"Oryps, don't be stubborn. You're sick and you need to rest. If you don't rest now then you need to rest later," Oryps nodded his head sleepily as my mate spoke to him. My jealousy was quickly replaced by my concern for the health of my friend.

"Oryps, baby, maybe she's right. You need to rest, baby," Oryps turned to face me after I spoke and for a moment I could see what I assume that my mate saw. Oryps was communicating entirely through his eyes that he was determined to help the turtle and that nothing I could say or do would stop him. He couldn't possibly rest when he knew that a little turtle needed his help.

"I'll resst later," Oryps said, and before I could say a single word Oryps flapped his wings. He took off into the sky faster than my eyes could follow. Within a short time, he was flying towards the forest with a grace and speed that I could never possibly match. Sheepfucka grinned at me, which showcased every misshapen tooth in his disgusting mouth, and then he ran towards the forest.

Why did Oryps bother spending his time with the weak creatures in our valley? Sheepfucka was an outcast who couldn't even fly properly, and Ekips was a runt who couldn't take care of himself. Someday I would understand why Oryps wasted his valuable time on these pitiful creatures, but that day was not that day.

"Why don't you ever ask me to rest, baby?" My mate smiled and extended her talons to presumably stroke me in an attempt to calm me down, but I moved back to avoid her talons before she could touch me. The expression of hurt on her face almost tamed my anger towards her.

"Ambrosia, don't be jealous. You sleep in our cave every night and almost every day, Oryps never sleeps. I care about both of you, but I worry about Oryps more than I worry about you," I listened to my mate poorly attempt to calm me down. Why would she possibly think that calling me a lazy dragon who sleeps all day would improve my mood?

"Are you saying that I'm lazy, baby?" My mate shook her head in response to my question.

"No, my love, I'm not saying that you are lazy. What I'm saying is that you take care of your body properly and Oryps does not. I've seen many of my friends die young over my lifetime, and I would hate to see Oryps die young as well," I listened intently as my mate explained her reasoning to me.

It wasn't very often that I actually considered how difficult it must have been for the queen to care about Sheepfucka or Oryps or me. With all of the dragons that she had known throughout her extremely long life and all of the friends she had seen die, how hard must it have been to allow herself to care about our health and happiness knowing that she would outlive us all? How many mates had she had over her long lifetime?

How old was my mate? I had absolutely no idea how old she was and she refused to tell me. I didn't even think that she knew how old she was. The older dragons in our colony believed that she had been alive for more than a thousand years, but she claimed that she had only been alive for a few hundred years.

She had mentioned that she had had at least 5 mates before me, and she claimed that all of them had lived a full life. If I was being generous I would assume that all of those mates lived to an old age of 35 years. That meant that she must have been at least 175 years old.

"I'll be alive for a long time, and so will Oryps, baby. You don't need to worry about either of us, baby," my mate snorted at me.

"How long will you be alive for then? 20 years? 30 years? It doesn't matter how long you live for, because I will continue to live for hundreds of years after you die," my mate sounded extremely mad, but she wasn't yelling. It felt as though she was trying to express her anger, her grief, and the affection she felt towards me all at once. I had no idea what I could say to her, so I stayed quiet and waited for her to continue her rant.

"My friends always say that they don't need to rest, they always get sick and refuse to listen to my advice. My friends always die," there were tears in her eyes and I slowly moved closer to her. I hated seeing my mate cry.

"Even if my friends slept a little more and took better care of themselves they would still have died. There was nothing I could have done to stop any of my friends from dying," I started to stroke her talons affectionately as she cried and ranted.

"Why can't I just have a friend who will stay with me forever? Why can't I have a single happy year in my life without death, without war, without sickness and just live that same year over and over again? I don't even know what I want! I just don't want to live through any more heartache," I continued to stroke her talons in a futile effort to calm her.

"The worst part is that I don't even remember most of my friend's names. I'm old, very old, but I still have many years of life ahead of me. Someday you and Oryps will die and I'm scared that I'll forget both of you," I tensed upon hearing that revelation. As selfish as it sounded, I always narcissistically believed that my mate would always remember me throughout her long life. I had never seriously considered the possibility that my mate might not have any memory of me at all within the next 200 years.

"It's okay, baby," I said to my mate and I kissed her talon gently. I could feel her muscles soften, so I kissed her again. I continued to plant kisses on her while she sobbed.

I couldn't possibly understand how my mate felt, and I couldn't possibly emphasize with the grief that my mate must have felt. But my role as a mate was to make her happy. Sometimes when I was angry, jealous or selfish I would forget that. If I could make her forget her lifetime of loss and regret for even a short moment, then I knew that I had performed a truly wonderful act of kindness for the dragon that I cared about the most.

"No, it's not okay. Someday you will die. Why do I keep allowing myself to care about dragons when I know I'm just going to be left broken-hearted and lonely when they die?" I listened to the sorrowful words of my mate and I sighed. What could I possibly say to make her feel better?

"My love, if I die tomorrow I will die happy knowing that I enjoyed your love and your friendship before I died, baby. You make me feel special, baby, you make me feel loved, baby, and I'll die happy knowing that I tried to make you feel the same way, baby," I smiled at my mate and I was happy to see her attempting to smile at me despite her tear-filled eyes.

"I know in my heart that Oryps feels the same way, baby. Don't worry about making him live longer, just worry about making him feel loved and letting him enjoy his life however he wants, baby," I tried to make my mate feel better, but I wasn't sure if I succeeded. She still continued to sob.

"I'm so selfish, so old, so fat, and so ugly. You and Oryps are so small, so selfless and so beautiful. I wish that I could be like you," I gasped a little once I heard her words. How could my mate consider me to be selfless when just a short while ago I was fuming with rage after she expressed concern over the health of my friend?

"How can you say that, baby! You're the most beautiful dragon in this entire colony, baby!" I didn't mean to raise my voice, but I didn't regret yelling at my mate at all. I saw her smile at me and stare at me the way that a very young dragon would look at a dragon who they admired after they received praise.

"Do you really think I'm beautiful?" I nodded my head enthusiastically. I was smiling like a complete fool who didn't care how silly a goofy grin could make a dragon look, while my mate was elegantly smiling as a sunbeam bathed her in the golden early morning light. I had always considered my mate to be beautiful, but because she spent so much time in her cave I didn't often get the chance to truly appreciate her beauty. Even with a face moistened with tears she still looked beautiful.

"Thank you," my mate said to me before she turned her head to face the forest where Oryps and Sheepfucka had traveled.

"I hear something," my mate said. Before I could ask any questions she clenched her talons and restrained me. She then flapped her enormous wings and in what felt like less than a second we were above the forest. By the time we had landed, I was a bit dazed and confused. The journey from the outside of our cave to the forest would have taken at least 10 minutes if I had flown normally. For my mate, the journey only took a couple of seconds.

I looked around once my mate unclenched her talons and I noticed that a number of trees had been flattened. I saw Sheepfucka beside me looking extremely bored as he absentmindedly groomed his fur. Oryps stood in front of Sheepfucka facing a group of 3 kishunimaras with a stoic look.

The kishunimara in the middle of the group facing Oryps was about half the size of the other kishunimaras. The middle kishunimara also seemed more intelligent than the other kishunimaras in the group since it was the only one who wasn't snarling and drooling on the ground.

"Night Star, dead," the middle kishunimara said with an extremely raspy voice that sounded much more feminine than I'd expect such a fearsome looking creature to sound. Oryps nodded his head in understanding and I envied him because I didn't understand anything about the scene in front of me.

"Want peace," the middle kishunimara said. The kishunimara took a few steps towards Oryps and it extended its paw for Oryps to shake. Oryps hesitated and the creature seemed to be confused by his behavior.

"I can't promisse you peace. We've been enemiess for yearss, I can't just tell every dragon to be nice to you jusst becausse your leader iss dead," the creature didn't seem to understand what Oryps was telling it.

"Not bad, others, kill us, want peace" Oryps listened intently as the creature in front of him spoke with its raspy high-pitched voice.

"Talk, peace, friends?" Oryps stared at the creature and the paw which the creature seemed to still be waiting for Oryps to shake. The other kishunimaras were staring at Oryps coldly. I looked up at my mate and I saw that she appeared to be studying the situation in front of her. It seemed as though my mate was attempting to determine if the kishunimara was trustworthy.

Oryps wordlessly reached out and shook the paw that the kishunimara had offered. I was surprised to see the kishunimara smile widely, and I was even more surprised when the kishunimara pulled Oryps into its body and hugged the dragon tightly.

"Thank you, friend!" Sheepfucka started laughing uncontrollably as the kishunimara held Oryps in its tight embrace with a smile on its face. Oryps seemed just as confused as I was about the actions of the kishunimara and my mate was staring at the scene with an amused expression.

"Name Australia!" Oryps clearly didn't know what to think about the situation, and he tried to remain as stoic as possible. However, when the kishunimara hugged him and proudly announced its name for all of us to hear, he couldn't stop himself from smiling.

Sheepfucka was rolling on the ground, howling with laughter, and my mate chuckled as she watched the furry dragon. I rolled my eyes at the behavior of the furry creature. How was it that three dragons, one of them being a valuable warrior and the other being the queen of the colony, could let their guards down in front of three kishunimaras?

"My name iss Orypss," Oryps said to the kishunimara who continued to hug him tightly. I noticed that the kishunimara had started rubbing its head against the purple dragon's chest when he spoke.

"Smooth," Australia whispered to itself as it continued to nuzzle the dragon's chest. Oryps seemed uncomfortable about the situation and wanted to release himself from the hug, but he didn't force the kishunimara to free him.

"Could you pleasse let me go?" Australia blushed and took a step back from the dragon as it released him from the embrace.

"Oi, Ambrosia, maybe ya should be the little gal's friend too. Get ya self a nice hug," Sheepfucka said from where he was laying on the ground. I glared at the furry dragon and he seemed to taunt me with the large grin on his face.

"This beast will never be my friend, baby," I said coldly to the furred dragon. Sheepfucka almost instantly stopped laughing and glared at me. I felt the eyes of the two kishunimaras standing behind Australia glaring at me as well. I didn't look to see if Australia and Oryps were also glaring at me.

"Kishunimaras are foul beasts, baby, and it will take more than a hug to make me think otherwise, baby," I explained my point of view to my friends and the kishunimaras. Sheepfucka and the kishunimaras continued to glare at me. Although I didn't look at Oryps, I hoped that he understood my viewpoint.

"Sshe issn't wrong. For all we know, Night Sstar iss alive and you three were ssent here to lie to uss and gain our trusst," I looked up and I saw the kishunimara look at Oryps with an expression that I couldn't quite understand. Tears were forming in its eyes and it seemed to be trying to convince Oryps that it would never lie to him.

The other two kishunimaras continued to glare at me but otherwise remained stoic. Before that moment I had never witnessed how kishunimaras behaved in a situation where they weren't fighting dragons, so I was genuinely curious as to how they would behave when they were forced into conversation and debate.

It seemed as though Australia was acting as a diplomat, while the other two were acting as guards to make sure nothing happened to the creature. I guessed that even mindless beasts could sometimes act civilized, like how in some of the human movies animals would act like humans.

"Kill us! Eat us! Escape, want peace!" Australia shouted in desperation, which seemed to shock Oryps. Australia started to tremble and Oryps quickly moved closer to the creature and embraced it. Australia seemed to calm down immediately as it relaxed in the embrace of the strong purple dragon.

"It will be alright. No dragon or kisshunimara will hurt you ass long ass you remain in thiss valley. You and any kisshunimara who wantss to live in peace can have my protection," Oryps vowed to protect the creatures and I rolled my eyes. Why did Oryps want to protect the weak and abnormal creatures in our valley?

"Three want peace, only three," Australia pointed to itself and the two kishunimaras behind it. The two beasts nodded their heads sadly and I genuinely felt some sympathy for them. They might have been foul beasts, but no creature deserved to be separated from their species because they believed that peace was preferable to war.

"Ssheepfucka, do you remember that resstaurant we vissited a couple of monthss ago?" The furry dragon nodded his head as he walked towards the two kishunimara who weren't being hugged by Oryps.

"The place that serves fruit or the place that kills sheep?" Sheepfucka asked his purple friend with noticeable malice in his voice. I was aware that there were some restaurants in the city where they served food to creatures who lived outside of the city. I was not aware that either Oryps or Sheepfucka had ever visited one of those places.

If neither of them told me that they had visited the city, then perhaps there were other things that they didn't bother to mention to me. Why would they feel that they had to keep secrets from me? Oryps and I were very close friends, I told him all of my secrets. He knew almost everything about me, but was it possible that there were a lot of things about him that I didn't know?

"You're only welcome at one of thosse placess. Take thesse two kisshunimarass there, get them a good meal then assk if they can offer them sshelter. Hopefully, they'll have a place big enough for them," Oryps sounded uncertain as he told Sheepfucka what he wanted him to do. The kishunimaras were just a little bit larger than me, and I knew for a fact that there weren't many rooms in the large towers that I could fit into.

But, Oryps did mention that both he and Sheepfucka had dined in at least two of the restaurants in the city. So, maybe they did have buildings that could accommodate kishunimaras that I was unaware of.

"What about that one?" Sheepfucka asked as he gestured with his head to the kishunimara who Oryps was hugging. "She needs a place ta stay too, right?" I didn't like what Sheepfucka seemed to be implying.

"Me and her will meet you there, I want to talk with her a little more. There'ss alsso a turtle here who needss our help, and I can't leave thiss foresst until I help it," Oryps explained to his friend. I could see my mate smiling as Oryps told us all what he planned to do.

"Aight, I'll meet ya there. Follow me ya wonderful beasts!" Sheepfucka happily announced before he flapped his wings and flew into the air. Oryps smirked as he raised three of his talons.

"Three," Oryps lowered one of his talons. "Two, one," Oryps lowered his last two talons just as Sheepfucka fell on the grass-covered ground. Australia giggled and Sheepfucka scowled.

"Dammit, ay still can't fly," Sheepfucka growled. Oryps grinned as he released Australia from his embrace and walked over to his friend. Oryps extended his talons to the furry dragon, and his friend accepted his aid.

"I don't know why you sstill try," Oryps said to his friend as he helped him up. Sheepfucka playfully grinned before he turned away from his friend and started walking in the direction of the city. The two kishunimaras looked uneasily at each other for a few seconds before they started following the furry dragon.

"Fuck! Where did that fucking branch come from!" Sheepfucka shouted once he was out of view. Oryps rolled his eyes and Australia giggled.

"Friend funny," Australia commented and Oryps nodded his head in agreement. Oryps sneezed and I rolled my eyes because I knew what was going to happen next.

"Oryps, please be careful. I don't want you to get our new friend sick," the purple dragon wiped his nose with his arm and seemed to seriously contemplate what my mate had said. It was one thing for him to be sick, it was another thing for him to think about getting another creature sick.

"It'ss just a cold, sshe'll be fine even if sshe doess catch it," Oryps explained. My mate didn't seem to be convinced.

"You have a fever," my mate bluntly said to the dragon. I thought that she wanted to say more to him but the melodramatic situation that had occurred earlier between us made her a little bit cautious about the extent to which she expressed her concern.

"I'll be fine. Ass long ass I can walk and talk I have an obligation to help anyone that needss to be helped," the dragon queen frowned at the purple dragon as he sneezed a second time.

"Oryps, promise me that you will rest as soon as our new friend is in a safe place," my mate said to the purple dragon as he wiped his nose with his arm.

"That might take a while," the dragon queen frowned as she reached out her talons and began gently rubbing the top of his forehead.

"Please, just promise that you will actually sleep today at some point. I'm worried about you," Oryps sneezed at the end of my mate's statement and my mate continued to frown as she stroked his forehead.

"I promisse that I'll ssleep ass ssoon ass Ausstralia and the turtle are ssafe," Oryps attempted to reassure the queen with his promise, but I doubted that she believed him.

"I'm going to be very mad at you if I find out that you broke your promise," my mate said to the purple dragon before she turned away from him.

"Ambrosia, can you please stay with him and make sure he gets some rest," I was unsure of how to respond. As much as I cared about Oryps, I didn't want to act like his babysitter and make sure he went to sleep. I also didn't want to be around the disgusting kishunimara that Oryps was alarmingly quick to trust.

"Well, umm," my mate gave me a stern look and I reluctantly nodded my head.

"Of course I'll stay with him, baby," I told my mate with a forced smile. "I'm always willing to help a friend, baby," my mate smiled and quickly licked my face as a gesture of appreciation, as well as affection.

"My love, that's such a wonderful sentiment," my mate said. I felt myself being released from her talons as she gently lowered my body on the ground. Before I had the chance to say goodbye, she had flapped her wings and taken flight.

When she was gone I was free to assess the damage she had done to the forest by simply sitting like a normal dragon and flying like a normal dragon. She had landed in a clearing of the forest, so she didn't do too much damage. She had only damaged the ten trees that were lying broken on the ground near where she had been sitting.

It was always interesting to think about just how destructive my mate could be without even intending to be destructive. Seeing the damage she did to the forest made me think about why such a big and powerful creature would ever want to be mates with such a small dragon like me.

I always tried not to see my mate as simply a big creature because I preferred to see her as nothing more than a beautiful dragon who I loved. But sometimes I felt like an insect when I was around her because of the enormous difference in size between us.

It's very silly to imagine a small insect like a fly or a spider being mates with a dragon. How silly must the relationship I had with the queen have looked to other dragons in our colony?

"Ah-choo," Oryps sneezed and broke my train of thought. I watched Oryps wipe his nose again with his arm. Australia seemed both curious and concerned for the health of the purple dragon whom she had only recently become acquainted with.

"Sick friend sleep, eat," Australia said to Oryps with its terrible sounding hissing voice. The kishunimara sounded like it was dragging its claws against a rock every time it spoke.

"I'll be fine. The turtle sshould be over there ssomewhere," Oryps pointed his talon at a small pond that I could vaguely see past the trees. "We've already wassted enough time. We can't let anything happen to it."

"Why not, baby? What's so special about a turtle, baby?" I didn't like the fact that my mate, Sheepfucka, and Oryps all seemed to know something that I didn't about the turtle. I never liked feeling stupid and I didn't like knowing that my friends willingly withheld information from me.

"It grantss wisshess," Oryps said simply as he started walking in the direction that he had pointed. Australia walked close to him like a loyal dog obediently following its master.

"It grants wishes, baby! You're wasting time with kishunimaras when a magic turtle that grants wishes is right here in this valley, baby!" I shouted at the purple dragon. Oryps turned his head to face me and smirked in the cocky yet charming way that only he seemed able to do.

"Yess, that'ss why I want to hurry up and help it," Oryps spoke with a tone of voice that made it sound like what he said was the most obvious thing in the world. On reflection, it probably was, but I still didn't like that side of Oryps.

Oryps was never as much of a jerk as Sheepfucka at his most obnoxious, but it still bothered me a lot whenever he seemed to stop treating me like a friend and more like a weak dragon who he dragged along on his quests to help others. Maybe that was why he traveled to the city with Sheepfucka and not me.

Why was Oryps the only real friend I had aside from my mate? Was I not likable? Oryps liked me, but Oryps seemed to like everyone. My mate liked me, or at least she claimed to like me. Maybe she just settled for being my mate because no one else found her enormous body to be attractive.

My mate did seem to care about Oryps more than me, and Oryps seemed to care about her as well. Why did my mate's heart seem to belong to Oryps instead of me, the dragon who she chose as her mate?

"Oryps, baby!" I shouted at the purple dragon who had moved quite a bit further away while I was engaged with my own thoughts.

"Can thiss wait until after we've found the turtle?" Oryps asked without slowing his pace or turning around. I growled at the dragon before I started running towards him as fast as my legs could carry me.

"No, it can't wait, baby! I want to know why my mate cares about you so much more than she does about me, baby!" I shrieked at the purple dragon as I ran towards him. It irritated me that he didn't seem to care about my outburst in the slightest bit as he continued to walk at a fairly languid pace.

"Why is my mate's heart always with you and never with me, baby?" I asked the dragon once I had ran past him and stood in front of him to block his path. "I don't hate you and I don't hate her, I just wish that her heart was with me instead of with you, baby."

I saw the purple dragon's eyes widen immediately after I had spoken and I felt the impact of his body as he pushed me down. I was lying on the ground with what felt like a sprained wing after the impact. I thought that Oryps would be angry after I shouted at him, but I didn't think that he would resort to using physical violence.

I looked up and I was shocked to see what looked like a giant heart in front of me with the head of my purple scaled friend poking out from beneath it. Oryps groaned in pain as his body appeared to be crushed by the massive heart.

"Bitch!" The kishunimara shrieked as it lunged at me. I rolled to the side and avoided its first attack, but I wasn't quick enough to avoid the creature picking me up and pinning my body against a nearby tree.

"Stupid bitch!" Australia shrieked at me as it pointed at the massive heart that was crushing my friend. "Make wish, kill friend," Australia's tone changed drastically when it spoke the last two words of her statement. The creature normally seemed to speak with a grating high-pitched voice, but when it claimed that I killed its friends its voice sounded like a low-pitched growl.

"Wish… I didn't-" my eyes widened in realization as I realized that I had made a wish without realizing it. That wish must have come true and resulted in my mate's heart falling on top of Oryps, which meant that I had killed the two dragons I cared about the most.

"I'm sorry, baby!" I yelled my apology to the angry creature in front of me. Tears were forming in my eyes and falling to the ground below. I could see Australia's mood wasn't affected at all by my apology.

"Help," Oryps weakly croaked from beneath the heart of my mate. Australia turned its head to face the fatally crushed purple dragon. The creature released me from its grip and ran to my friend.

"How help friend?" The kishunimara asked the crushed purple dragon. Oryps groaned in pain underneath the weight of my mate's heart.

"Find the turtle, make a wissh. It'ss around here ssomewhere," Oryps gave the kishunimara his instructions, then he sneezed again. I grimaced when I realized that he couldn't wipe his nose.

"I wish that," I paused for a moment as I spoke. I didn't know what I could wish for that would let both Oryps be healed and my mate to presumably still be alive after her heart was magically removed.

"One wissh only," Oryps explained to me. He then made a horrible gasping sound that pained me to hear. Australia stroked the top of his head with its furry clawed hands. Then, without warning, the creature leaned into Oryps and bit down on his neck.

"Stop it you monster!" I yelled at the creature as soon as I heard Oryps shriek in agony. I ran to the creature and tackled it with the full force of my body, which caused the creature to break free from Oryps. I looked at the purple dragon and I noticed that he was missing a chunk of his neck.

Australia spat out the chunk of flesh from its mouth and glared at me. I glared at the creature as I tried to tell it without speaking a single word how much I hated it. I doubted that the creature would have heard me anyway due to the screaming from Oryps.

My eyes widened as I realized that despite his crushed body and now partially missing neck the purple dragon was screaming in pain. He should have died as soon as the chunk of flesh was torn from his neck, but he didn't. What had the creature done to him?

"Venom. Alive but in pain," Australia tried to explain what it had done to Oryps, but it wasn't doing a very good job. "Make him die slowly."

I cringed as I heard the last thing that Australia had said. I'd heard terrible things about kishunimara venom, and I remembered Oryps explaining to me that the venom could make the head of a dragon live for 30 minutes after being removed from its body. I never asked Oryps how he knew that because I assumed that I wouldn't like the answer.

"He's in pain you freak, baby!" I shrieked at the creature who had poisoned my friend. Australia growled at me, baring its fangs in an attempt to intimidate me.

"Wish make death, venom make pain. Venom better!" Australia spat at me and I miraculously dodged the venom by quickly leaping to the side. Oryps continued to howl in pain, which seemed to kindle my burning rage.

"You're a monster, baby! If you had just stayed in your fucking territory this wouldn't have happened, baby!" I yelled at the beast in front of me who appeared to be seething with rage just like I was.

"Night Star dead! Friends, family, dead! No home, only dead!" Australia screamed at me with its horrible high-pitched raspy voice that made me want to cut off my own ears so that I wouldn't have to hear it.

"No care! Selfish!" Australia screeched at me and I had to cover my ears. The combined auditory assault of the screams of agony from the purple dragon and Australia were too much for me to handle.

"You can't even talk right, you ugly beast, baby!" I shrieked at the animal while I held my talons tightly against my ears. That appeared to anger the kishunimara greatly, and I felt its bodyweight crash against mine as it tackled me.

I started attacking it with my talons, scratching at every bit of exposed flesh I could reach while the creature did the same thing with its claws as we rolled on the ground. Eventually, I pushed it away and we both glared at each other. Both of us were breathing heavily and both of our bodies were covered with scratches and blood.

Oryps continued to scream in the background as we stared tensely at each other, waiting for the other creature to say a single word or attempt another attack.

But, we never attacked each other. We just continued to grit our teeth and growl at each other for what felt like ages while Oryps continued to scream in agony in the background. I was angry but I wasn't sure if I should direct my anger at Australia and murder her, or direct my energy towards finding the turtle who could save Oryps and my mate.

I suppose the decision should have been obvious, but there was never any dragon who thought rationally when they were angry.

"You would make an excellent pet," I heard a mysterious voice speak outside of my field of vision as I stared at the kishunimara in front of me. I refused to take my eyes off of the creature for a single moment because I suspected that it would attack me again if I looked away.

"Would you like to be my pet?" I heard the voice speak again, yet I refused to look away from the creature. Australia looked at whatever had spoken and it growled lowly once it had apparently identified the source of the voice.

"You kill Night Star!" Australia shrieked at whatever had spoken before it lunged at it. Out of curiosity, I turned my head to look at the creature.

I was surprised to see a dragon that looked incredibly different from any other dragon I had ever seen before. The creature was about half the size of me and it appeared to have four horns on its head that all converged into a single point in front of its left eye, which made it look like it only possessed a single horn. The scales covering it were all a bright shade of orange that seemed to match the color of the sun when it rose in the morning, and its small wings were colored black like the sky at night.

In its right hand I could see a turtle with a rainbow-colored shell with only two legs thrashing as hard as it possibly could within the grip of the dragon. The dragon didn't seem to pay any attention to the pathetic thrashing creature it was holding.

The strange dragon lifted up its talons as Australia lunged at it. To my surprise, a cloud of blue smoke seemed to magically appear in front of it. The blue smoke appeared to twist itself until it resembled a large snake, then it wrapped itself around Australia and prevented it from moving.

"Kill Night Star! Evil!" Australia yelled as it helplessly attempted to free itself. The strange dragon smiled and stepped towards the kishunimara.

"I wanted to keep one of you creatures as a pet after I killed your leader, but the rest of your species was far too violent to be tamed," the dragon stood in front of the kishunimara stuck in the grip of the strange blue smoke.

"You're so much different than the others, that's why I allowed you to live and escape. I wanted to see what you would do," the dragon reached out his talons and started to stroke the fur of the kishunimara. Australia growled at the dragon as he ran his talons through the creature's fur.

"You were so friendly when you hugged your purple friend, you ran in fear instead of joining in the bloodshed when your fellow kishunimaras ripped each other limb from limb after Night Star's death," Australia hissed at the dragon when he mentioned the fallen leader of the kishunimaras.

"Why are you so angry with me? You're my new pet and I'm your master. You should be honored," the strange dragon continued to stroke the angry kishunimara.

"No pet, want free," Australia hissed at the small dragon. The strange dragon smiled at the beast.

"Oh my darling pet, you're just a little bit upset because I had to restrain you. If I let you free you'll just hurt yourself again," the dragon stopped stroking the kishunimara and raised its talon so that it could see the blood that covered it.

"So many injuries and so much blood staining your pretty fur. When I take you home with me I'll need to give you a nice warm bath. Doesn't that sound lovely?" Australia hissed at the dragon, and he chuckled in amusement.

"You've probably never had a bath in your life. You don't know how good it feels to surround yourself with warm cleansing clear water. It's a good thing that I chose you to be my pet," the dragon grinned at the kishunimara as he brought the turtle he was holding to the kishunimara’s face.

"I think that I should give you a nice little treat before I take you to your new home. Go ahead, my pet, wish for anything you'd like," Australia stared at the turtle that the dragon held in front of it, as though it was unsure of what to do.

"Wish friends okay," Australia whispered to the turtle after a moment of hesitation. The turtle's shell glowed and my eyes widened as two bright beams of light shot out of the turtle's glowing shell. The first beam traveled in the direction of my mate's cave, while the second beam shot directly towards Oryps.

Oryps immediately stopped howling in pain once the beam of light hit him. I saw the giant heart that had been crushing him vanish and I winced as I saw his crushed body. My purple friend looked like an insect that had been crushed by a dragon which was half-heartedly clinging on to the few short moments of life it had left.

Oryps opened his eyes and stood up, which allowed me to study the damage that my mate's heart had done to him. The most shocking thing that I could see was that his liver and kidneys appeared to be outside of his body, lying on the ground.

I could see other troubling injuries, such as the fact that his arms and legs were all bent at angles that would horrify a normal dragon, but nothing was as shocking as the vital internal organs lying outside of his body on the ground.

Suddenly, the organs were sucked back into his body and the purple dragon's eyes widened. He looked down and watched as an invisible force seemed to mend the holes where the organs had emerged from. I could hear the sounds of sickening cracks from where I was standing as I watched his broken appendages appear to be painfully mending themselves. His entire body, from his legs to his wings, was mended in less than a minute by some kind of magic.

The strange orange scaled dragon smiled as the body of Oryps was repaired in front of his eyes. "Fascinating," the dragon whispered to himself before he turned his attention to the captive kishunimara.

"Well my pet, you got your treat. Will you be good from now on?" Australia snarled at the strange orange dragon.

"Let her go!" Oryps yelled at the dragon as he charged towards him. The orange dragon never looked away from Australia as he lifted his talons and blue smoke appeared to surround Oryps, which left him immobilized in the same manner that Australia had been immobilized.

"My kindness is wasted on savage creatures like you," the strange orange dragon spoke in a tone that reminded me of my mate on certain occasions when she was disappointed with me.

"You seem different from the other savages in this colony. You seem brave and kind, unlike this pathetic creature," the dragon gestured towards me.

"I'm just as brave as anyone in this colony, baby!" I shouted at the strange dragon. He didn't seem to take my claim very seriously.

"I suppose you are a brave dragon. You just don't care enough about this handsome purple dragon or this beautiful kishunimara to rescue them from my grip," the strange orange dragon spoke to me as though he was scolding me for not attacking him.

"The savage leaders all need to be removed from power so that I can control all of the sapient species in the world. All I want is peace, but all of the creatures want war, what a shame," the strange dragon walked up to Oryps and started rubbing his purple scales.

"Every kishunimara is dead except for the three females who escaped the carnage after Night Star's death. When your dragon queen dies your colony will die as well. I never wanted this to happen, but we all need to make sacrifices to create a better world," the strange dragon started rambling, but the only thing that he said which mattered to me was the death of my mate.

"If you harm my mate I will make you suffer a fate worse than death, baby," I growled at the strange dragon. The dragon chuckled and I growled a second time as I stomped my foot on the ground.

"What's so funny, baby?" The strange dragon chuckled yet again.

"Your mate ate Vein's mate. Vein has been begging me to let her get revenge on your mate because she wants to make her suffer for what she did. She says that she wants to make your mate suffer a fate worse than death," the strange dragon chuckled.

"I guess that spoiled the punchline of the joke. I apologize, I like to explain things. I don't like keeping secrets," the strange dragon grinned at me.

"Anyways, I have everything I came to this valley full of savages to claim. The last rainbow turtle on the planet, one of the last kishunimaras, and a fine young dragon in the prime of his life. I suspect that Vein is already making your mate suffer right now," blue smoke started to surround the body of the strange dragon.

"I know that you don't care enough about these wonderful creatures to save them from me, but I hope that you care enough about your mate to save her from Vein," the dragon said with a smile. The strange dragon slowly disappeared, along with my friends, as the smoke appeared to consume them.

"I hope that I'll see you again, but I'm not optimistic."


	9. The Book of Oryps: Chapter 7 - Sir Phobos

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Back with another chapter. If you want a link to the full story, in chronological order to make it easier to read (it's finished, but, I only have the first 11/18 chapters in the doc right now) please leave a comment.
> 
> Anyways, the Sir Phobos chapters are very personal to me. The character of Sir Phobos was essentially created for me to work out my feelings for my sister 'abandoning me', my dad pressuring me to do something I didn't want to do that ended up being a mistake, and my mom just generally kinda messing up my life and continuing to do so because of a very misguided kind of love.
> 
> He's a self-insert, yes, but I wouldn't call him a Gary Stu. It's more like, well, Reaper is basically me, the author, for how powerful he is. So, even though Sir Phobos himself isn't necessarily perfect, Reaper is always there to make sure he never dies and almost always succeeds.
> 
> Though, that's pretty much saying that Rey isn't a Mary Sue, she just has The Force always looking out for her, ensuring that she succeeds, so I wouldn't blame anyone for thinking that he is one.
> 
> I do feel really bad about how I'm pretty much just using this fan fiction to post my story here, and I suspect that it isn't really being read. But, it just, I dunno, feels right to post it here. It's better than me not updating it at all, I guess. I really wish I was getting some comments, though. I guess the reason why I'm not is because, well, this is a very off-putting story, unfortunately, it's not being presented in an appealing way at all, I guess.

**Chapter 7: Sir Phobos**

King Priapism was a magic-user with so much power that, if he had wanted to, he could destroy every remaining building in London and murder every single unicorn with a single wave of his talons. Only I was aware of just how powerful he was when he entered the city.

I realized that the destiny of the unicorns was to be servants to the immortal and powerful creature just as the humans were servants to their various deities. King Priapism would be the king of every unicorn in every land in the world, and we would all become stronger under his rule.

King Priapism's most faithful followers, such as myself, would be granted power. Since I was his most faithful follower, I was given the power that I desired when he made me his representative in London, and my half-sister Telia was his representative in the unicorn colony near Vanhoover.

In a moment of weakness, my father actually fell in love with a disgusting black-coated unicorn. He was a weak-minded fool who tried to leave me and my mother so that he could be with his disgusting black-coated unicorn lover, and the child that she had given birth to.

I remembered seeing him beg for me to spare the life of his child. I remembered aiming my horn directly at the heart of the frightened infant as my father and the whore he had chosen to love instead of my mother watched from their bed.

My father should have realized that the deadliest unicorn warrior the world had ever seen would have found him and his new family wherever he decided to hide. It didn't take me long to discover the redwood tree that he had hollowed out and claimed as his home.

He begged me to let Telia live. If I had known back then how much of a burden Telia would become, I would have killed all three of the unicorns and burned the tree. I always had a weakness for innocent children, and I also shared the same weakness that many unicorns had. 

It sounded odd, but unicorn soldiers like me would feel a powerful urge to suck on the breasts of beautiful human virgins whenever we saw them. Thankfully, not many beautiful human women were virgins when we lived among them, and the few that were around didn't stand in front of us baring their breasts.

My dad claimed that both he and his new lover would willingly give up their lives if I allowed Telia to live. However, my dad claimed that before I killed him I had to promise that I would take care of her.

I didn't promise anything to my dad as I impaled him and his new wife. I was about to impale the little baby Telia in front of my dying dad just so that it would be the last thing that he would ever see. But in a moment of weakness, I decided to spare the life of the child.

I remembered asking the child to climb on my back and promising her that I would make sure that she had a good life. I carried her to my home in London, and for years I raised her as though she was my own child. We became as close as siblings could possibly be even though I found her black coat to be disgusting. Being seen in public with her was damaging to my reputation, but since I was the greatest unicorn who ever lived, and I was either heavily respected or feared by every unicorn in London, I could afford to lose a little bit of respect.

Our relationship changed dramatically when Telia discovered that she had magical abilities. Unlike me, Telia had the ability to use the power of red magic to her advantage. She became fascinated by her incredible power, and she spent six months locked in her room reading every book that she could find which explained her strange powers in any detail. She even read old human fairy tales about magic because she believed that she could get some insight into how she could use her powers by reading Sleeping Beauty.

"It's a magic apple, as you can see. I summoned it after reading Sleeping Beauty," Telia was beaming with pride as she held the magical apple in front of my face using the red smoke. I smiled at her enthusiasm, then I took a bite out of the apple.

I immediately spat out the horrible tasting apple. She giggled at me and I glared at her. "I'm sorry, brother, that the apple tastes bad. Forgive me please and don't be mad," at that point I still loved her and I thought that the way that she spoke was charming.

I saw the apple in front of me disappear, and I saw a beautiful green pear appear in front of my face. I was tempted to bite it, but I suspected that it would taste just as bad.

"If you don't like pears, I can make it an orange," I smirked when I heard the word that Telia hated more than any other for obvious reasons.

"That's the first time I've ever heard you speak normally," I remarked to the unicorn. Telia seemed confused for a moment, and I wondered if she realized what I meant. When it had occurred to her what she had said, she bashfully turned her head away from me to hide her embarrassment.

"Well, there isn't a word that rhymes with orange," Telia admitted.

For a while, things were nice between us. We got along well and talked to each other on a regular basis. I yearned for those wonderful years that I had with her.

Eventually, my little half-sister decided that she needed to leave London behind and travel to a place with other unicorns with magical powers. She believed that she needed to become stronger and be with unicorns like her instead of normal unicorns like me.

"Please dear brother, can't you see? I need to be with other creatures just like me," I was crushed. After all of the sacrifices that I had made to give her a life in the greatest colony of unicorns in the world, she decided that she wanted to go live with a bunch of weird magic-users in a small town.

"If you leave this city, I won't let you return," I couldn't show any weakness, not even to my own half-sister. I was the greatest unicorn in the entire world and my half-sister should have been grateful to have the opportunity to be near me on a regular basis. Why would she ever want to leave me?

"Brother dear, I need to leave. I hope that you will visit me," I couldn't bring myself to look at her as the red smoke surrounded her and her body faded away. I waited until she had fully disappeared before I allowed tears to run down my face.

"Are you enjoying your massage, Sir Phobos?" My thoughts were interrupted by the sweet high-pitched voice of Butterscotch, one of my personal servants. I had always enjoyed looking at pink-coated unicorns, so whenever I selected a female servant I made sure that they had a pink coat.

Butterscotch probably had the fluffiest pink coat of all of my servants, which was why I often spent my free moments during the day allowing her to massage my aching muscles. I had tried having sex with her a few times, but as great as her massages were, the sex wasn't fun for me at all. She wouldn't say anything as I thrust into her or react in any way aside from the occasional moan. That just wasn't any fun.

"Your touch pleases me, you should be proud," the unicorn seemed to be beaming with pride at my compliment. Every unicorn in London seemed to hold me in high regard, and my compliments were worth more than gold for many unicorns. 

"Great Sir Phobos!" I groaned when I heard the annoying voice of the white-scaled city dragon that King Priapism had requested I employ. The dragon, whose name was Graze, was a nuisance. I usually agreed with everything that King Priapism said, but employing Graze was one of the few things that I had ever argued with King Priapism about.

"What is it?" I growled at the dragon who had rudely walked into my room during my massage. Knowing him, he was probably just going to tell me that one of the unicorns had broken a law.

"A unicorn was caught using red magic," I could feel my body stiffen. I had outlawed the use of red magic after my sister had left. 

Blue magic was exclusive to dragons, while red magic was exclusive to unicorns. In order for me to use blue magic, I had to drink King Priapism's blood, as well as smear some of his blood on my skin. King Priapism claimed that simply drinking the blood would allow my subconscious mind to use magic while smearing it on my body would allow my conscious mind to use it.

If King Priapism decided that a unicorn was worthy of using blue magic he would grant them the ability to use it the same way he had given me the ability. Only a few unicorns in the city had been given the ability to use blue magic.

"What do you want me to do with her?" Graze asked me. I had never actually punished a unicorn who used red magic because every unicorn who could use red magic would escape from the city and travel to a town that was more accommodating towards magic-users. Why didn't that unicorn escape? Why did she allow herself to be caught?

"Where is she?" I asked the dragon standing in front of my throne. I assumed that she was being held captive somewhere, perhaps she was being watched by Judas, a fellow white-coat who was one of the few unicorns King Priapism had allowed to use blue magic.

"She's just outside your home, Sir Phobos," the dragon said. "Her parents agreed to bring her to you. They asked me to ask you not to punish her too severely," it seemed very odd that a magic-user would be brought to me by her parents. With the exception of my half-sister, magic-users couldn't use their natural powers until they were at least 15 years old.

"How old is she?" I was already trying to guess what his answer would be. Telia was eight years old when she had gained the ability to use red magic, so perhaps the unicorn would be just a little bit older. Maybe she was nine or ten years old?

"She's six years old," my eyes widened in shock. I had never heard of a single unicorn in our entire history that was able to use magic naturally at such a young age. The only possible way that I could imagine her being able to use magic was if someone had performed a ritual on her and made her drink blood. But even then, it still wasn't likely that she would have been able to use magic at such a young age.

"What did she do?" I was dreading what Graze would tell me. I hoped that she had simply used her magic to do something simple, like moving something small or making a fruit appear.

"Sir Phobos, you might think that this is a little bit silly," I didn't like the sound of that. "She used her magic to steal cookies from a locked cupboard in her parent's home, then she transported herself somewhere to eat them," I was shocked. Transportation magic was something that not many unicorns, myself included, could do properly.

It took Telia a decade to fully master transportation magic, and it took King Priapism at least five years to master it. Those two were magical prodigies gifted with a level of power that very few creatures could match, and the little unicorn might have surpassed them.

_ "Sir Phobos, I need to speak with you," _ I heard the voice of King Priapism in my head and I growled. I needed to deal with the unicorn quickly because if Priapism found out about the unicorn he might decide to adopt her as a pet. He had always had a fascination with dangerous and strange creatures.

"Just bring her in here quickly, and I'll deal with her," Graze nodded his head and turned around. I watched him as he walked out of my throne room and when I was sure he was gone I allowed myself to sigh deeply.

"Fuck," I said to myself. "This isn't how I wanted to spend my day off," Butterscotch tried to massage my shoulders and I swatted her hoof away.

"I'm not in the mood," I said bitterly. "Just leave, now," Butterscotch knew better than to question my orders. As she left the room I admired the scars on her back and the various bruises on her body that she had received after a few times when we had sex after my nightly workout.

She would stare at me for hours as I worked to maintain my perfect body. Even in my late-40s I still cared about keeping in shape. My muscles couldn't be allowed to become soft and my mind couldn't be allowed to dull. The admiration in the eyes of my servants confirmed that I was a magnificent specimen that was worthy of their devotion and lust.

Graze walked into the room followed by two adult unicorns with the young magic-user following close behind. She seemed to be very nervous, which was good. She should have been nervous to face me after breaking one of my laws.

The young unicorn was a purple-coat, her mother was a purple-coat and her father was a white-coat. Inter-coat relationships were fairly common, but it was rare for a white-coat to impregnate a unicorn who wasn't a white-coat and then raise the child. The last white-coat that I could think of who did that was my father, and he was killed before he could see his child become an adult.

"Graze, King Priapism will be here soon. Prepare something nice for him to eat when he gets here," Graze nodded his head and left the room, leaving me alone with the two proud parents and their darling little girl.

"Why did you break one of my laws, little filly?" I used the condescending word that humans used to use to address us. Stallion, mare, filly and horse were the condescending words that humans created to refer to us. They came up with their own names for us rather than allow us to name ourselves, and we found that to be offensive.

It didn't matter how much food they gave us, how much love they gave us, or how they worshipped the few unicorns who could use red magic because we always felt like they viewed us with condescension.

"I'm really sorry," the little unicorn seemed so nervous. "I don't know why I did it. I just really wanted a cookie, but mommy locked them in the cupboard. I used my magic that daddy told me to never ever use to get the cookies," I couldn't help myself from chuckling. If Telia had been able to use magic when she was six, she would have probably done the same thing.

"Please, Sir Phobos, show mercy to my little girl. She's a white-coat and she made a mistake," the father of the girl pleaded for my mercy. He was wasting his breath, because I didn't have mercy and I never forgave anyone who disobeyed my orders. I didn't even show mercy to my own father.

"She is not a white-coat, and even if she was I would show her no mercy. She broke one of my laws and she needs to be punished," I raised my hoof into the air and a cloud of blue smoke appeared in front of the little girl. I expected her to be as afraid of the blue smoke as every other unicorn in the city was.

I was surprised when she giggled at the smoke and touched it with her hoof.

"It's so cute!" The little girl exclaimed. "It's like baby magic!" I was shocked when I saw a large cloud of red smoke appear in front of me that I assumed that the girl had summoned. The girl was giggling happily as she ran her hoof through my cloud of blue smoke, while I was staring at the red smoke unsure of how to react to it.

As quickly as it appeared, the red smoke in front of me vanished. I swore under my breath when I saw that the blue smoke that I had summoned had vanished as well. I had only known two creatures in my entire life who could make the magic smoke disappear. Neither of them were creatures that I wanted to see at the moment.

"Sir Phobos, were you planning to use the gift that I gave you to murder a sweet little girl?" I sighed and reluctantly nodded my head as King Priapism walked into the room. The parents of the little girl immediately bowed their heads when they heard his voice, and I could see the girl mimicking her parents by bowing as well.

"King Priapism, she's more than just a sweet little girl. She's very dangerous and we need to deal with her as soon as possible," I scowled at the little girl who was smirking at me. She was probably thinking about my "baby magic."

King Priapism stood in front of the six-year-old unicorn bowing in front of him and trying to contain her giggles. I watched as he raised his talons and a cloud of blue smoke surrounded the little girl. I knew that King Priapism wouldn't kill a little unicorn unless he was provoked, but I silently hoped that he would use his magic to murder the unicorn.

"What is your name, little girl?" King Priapism asked. I watched as she lifted her head and stared at the deformed face of the greatest of all dragons.

"My name is Dusk," the dragon smiled at the unicorn. I watched as he ran his talons through the smoke.

"Hmm, I think that this is sufficient. If I recall correctly, this was around the level of power that Telia had when she was 14," King Priapism drew back his talons and took a step backward.

"Little girl, Sir Phobos says that you are dangerous. Is he correct?" The unicorn shook her head.

"I'm not dangerous. He's just jealous because I have big girl magic and he only has baby magic," the unicorn stuck her tongue out at me and I glared at her. I didn't want to be humiliated in front of King Priapism, especially not by such a young girl.

"Hmm, well, why don't you show me your big girl magic," the little unicorn seemed confused. I knew that if the unicorn managed to somehow impress King Priapism with her power he would probably adopt her as a pet, or worse, his daughter. If she wasn't able to impress King Priapism then he would claim that I was weak because I considered her to be a threat.

"Okie-dokie!" The girl giggled as she lifted her hoof into the air inside the cloud of blue smoke. I could see some red smoke appearing to take the place of the blue smoke, but as quickly as the smoke would appear it would disappear. I didn't think that was impressive at all, but Priapism seemed fascinated.

The little unicorn appeared to be struggling to make her red smoke appear. I could see that she was concentrating as hard as she could, but she was unable to make much more than a small amount of the blue smoke disappear.

"Hmm, if I had to guess I would say that you're probably as strong as Telia was when she was 11. Let me adjust my test accordingly," I watched as King Priapism lifted his talons again. The blue smoke immediately vanished and was replaced by the red smoke conjured up by the unicorn. The unicorn smiled as she felt the red smoke surround her.

"See! I told you I had big girl magic!" The unicorn seemed so proud about her abilities, despite the fact that King Priapism had admitted that he made his own blue smoke a little weaker just so that she could summon her own cloud of red smoke.

"Well, you're not as powerful as Sir Phobos thinks you are, but you have potential. If you were given proper training, I could see you becoming truly powerful," King Priapism stroked his chin.

"Have you heard about a great unicorn magic-user named Telia?" The unicorn nodded her head vigorously. I watched as a small cloud of red smoke appeared in front of her and two items immediately appeared on the floor. One of them, to my dismay, was a doll that looked a little bit like Telia. The other item was a book titled: Basic Magic Theory, which I remembered was written by Telia when she was 19 years old.

"Of course I know about Telia! She's the strongest magic-user in the whole wide world! She's so cool, and brave, and smart, and pretty, and-" I shut her up by making a small cloud of blue smoke appear around her mouth. I didn't want to hear the little bitch tell me about how great my half-sister was.

It didn't take her long to make the blue smoke disappear. She glared at me as soon as she had completely removed any trace of my magic. "That was super duper rude!" She shouted at me. I stuck out my tongue at her, just to confirm that even though I had the body of a fairly old unicorn, I had the maturity of a 6-year-old.

"Everything that you said was correct, except for one thing," King Priapism raised his talons and I watched in admiration as the entire room filled with blue smoke.

"Telia isn't the strongest magic-user in the world, I am," The unicorn's eyes widened as she stared at the room-filling cloud of blue smoke that had been summoned by the dragon. She seemed to be stunned by the amount of power that King Priapism possessed, just like I had been when he first demonstrated his power to me.

"I can teach you how to use your power. I can make you stronger, smarter and better than you are now," King Priapism lowered his talons and the blue smoke disappeared from the room. "I want you to live with me, and I want to train you as my apprentice. What do you want?" The unicorn stared in wonderment at the incredibly powerful dragon in front of her.

"I, umm, well, I want the power, but..." she turned her head to face her parents who didn't seem to know how to react to the situation. "I love my mommy and daddy, I don't want to leave them to live with you," King Priapism frowned and walked towards the proud parents.

"Well, it is a little bit disappointing that you don't want to be my apprentice. It would be a shame to let talent like yours be wasted," at that moment, Graze walked into the room holding a large ceramic plate. I could see some chopped watermelon, red berries and apples on the plate, as well as a glass of water. I never liked apples much, but I always thought that kiwis were delicious.

Graze carefully walked up to King Priapism and lowered the plate of food in front of him, then he placed the glass on the ground. He bowed respectfully to the dragon.

"King Priapism, it is my pleasure to be able to see you again. I hope you enjoy this meal I have prepared for you," King Priapism reached down and picked up a slice of watermelon from the plate.

"You really know how to make me feel like a king," King Priapism grinned as he placed the slice of watermelon into his mouth. He smiled contently as he chewed the delicious treat.

"Have you ever tried watermelon before, my sweet little Duck?" The little unicorn pouted. "My name is Dusk, not Duck, you silly dragon," Graze gasped and immediately slapped the little unicorn across her face.

"How dare you speak that way to our great king?! Apologize this instant!" I smiled widely when I saw the tears forming in the eyes of the little unicorn. I was looking forward to seeing something terrible happen to the irritating dragon.

"You, y-you, you're mean!" A cloud of red smoke formed around the sobbing unicorn. Before anyone in the room could react, the unicorn vanished. King Priapism studied the spot where the unicorn used to be.

"Fascinating. She's so young, yet she's already mastered transportation magic," King Priapism turned his gaze to the dragon who had upset the unicorn that he was interested in.

"You shall find that beautiful young unicorn and apologize to her," King Priapism turned to face the unicorn parents. "You two will convince her to be my apprentice. Do whatever you need to do," Dusk's father seemed pleased about King Priapism's request, while her mother seemed nervous.

"King Priapism, she's our daughter. She isn't your weapon and she isn't your toy," Dusk's mother explained to the dragon who seemed to be patiently listening to her.

"She isn't my weapon or my toy, she is my pet, just like you all are," I watched as the dragon raised his talons and a cloud of smoke appeared to surround the necks of the two unicorns. I saw them gasp as they struggled to breathe.

"If my pets refuse to follow my orders, they will need to be disciplined. If my pets absolutely refuse to obey me, they will need to be, umm," King Priapism lowered his talons and the blue smoke disappeared from the necks of the unicorns. I watched in amusement as the unicorns greedily inhaled as much oxygen as they could fit in their lungs.

"Graze, the humans had a word for killing their disobedient pets. What was that word?" The white unicorn looked at me with a horrified expression, while his wife appeared to be silently pleading with me to convince King Priapism to spare their pathetic lives.

"Euthanize," Graze smiled uneasily as he said the word. The little dragon was always uncomfortable seeing other creatures die, as well as seeing other creatures in pain. He might have been a better asset to me if he wasn't so uncomfortable around death. Maybe I would have liked him more if we had fought together in a battle.

"Yes, euthanize. I'll euthanize all of my disobedient pets," King Priapism grinned wickedly as he stared at the frightened unicorns in front of him. "So, tell me, are you two going to continue being disobedient?"

"King Priapism, I would never disobey you!" The white unicorn spoke a little bit too loudly and a little bit too quickly. "If you want my daughter, you can have her! Just, please, promise me that you won't hurt her," I could feel my hard gaze soften a little bit. I remembered being in that exact situation years earlier when Telia wanted to train with King Priapism. Except, I was selfish, I wanted Telia to be hurt and broken by King Priapism. I wanted her to give up on magic and come home to be with me.

Her room in my home was just how she left it, except for her toys and books. She would periodically make trips to the room to take her toys and books with her. When she first teleported away to the unicorn settlement near Vanhoover she hadn't fully mastered her powers yet. She ended up teleporting herself into a dragon's cave, then she got scared and tried to teleport back. She ended up in the water struggling to swim.

I happened to be taking a walk to clear my head after our fight and I saw her struggling to swim in the ocean. I dragged her body to the shore and she hugged me as she thanked me for saving her life. She told me about the terrifying dragon queen she had encountered and she asked if she could sleep with me that night.

"Please brother, I'm very scared. I need to wait a night before I go there," she probably would have chosen a better rhyme if she hadn't been so traumatized. I let her sleep with me in my bed, just like we did when we were younger.

"Brother? Brother?" She tapped my shoulder with her hooves. I groggily opened my eyes.

"Bad dream?" She nodded her head sadly. I gave her a reassuring smile as I placed my foreleg around her in what I thought was a comforting way. Providing comfort was not something that I was ever very good at doing.

"Brother Phobos, please, I think. I want a glass of warm milk to drink," I didn't think I could ever forget how cute Telia could look when she wanted me to do something for her. I sighed and reluctantly stood up. I walked towards the kitchen and Telia followed me.

I scraped the steel outfitted to my horn against a block of quartz to create a spark which lit a candle in the kitchen. While the dragons in the city under the control of King Priapism had the advantage of having a dedicated magic user who would make sure that the human technology left behind was working, unicorns were too proud to resort to using human technology. The quartz block and steel horn covers were one of our many technological achievements.

I used my teeth to move a pot lying on the table, and I brought it to our milk dispenser. Once I had placed the pot in the proper position, I used my horn to move the metal ball keeping the milk in the dispenser. The milk fell into the pot, and once it was filled to my satisfaction I moved my horn to allow the ball to continue to keep the milk inside.

I moved the pot to our makeshift stove, which was essentially just a little fire pit and a small iron cage. I placed the pot onto the cage and ignited the fire pit with my horn and a block of quartz. I didn't need to worry about kindling because my servants always made sure that the stove was stocked up with wood and spare bits of paper.

Within minutes the fire was big and healthy. I smiled at my work and I turned around to see that Telia was looking at me with a shy smile on her face. I was fully aware that if she wanted to she could have just used her magic to make the job much easier, but she enjoyed watching me work.

"I hope that you can hear me clearly. Brother, I'm gonna miss you dearly," my eyes narrowed as I watched the milk boiling in the pot. I really didn't want her to leave me. My mother committed suicide after my father left her, and I killed my father. Telia was the only family that I had left, and if she went away, I would be alone.

Well, not quite alone. I would still have my servants, and Reaper, the silly little black dragon who had given me my armor. I never needed the metal armor to be strong, but I wasn't unappreciative of the gift.

"Telia, please don't leave," I lifted the pot and placed it on the floor in front of her. I knew that the fire would burn out eventually, so I didn't bother putting it out.

Telia smiled uneasily as she lapped up the hot milk. I knew that she didn't want to leave me, but she felt like she had to leave. She wanted to have more power and more knowledge about her fantastic magical abilities. I understood how she felt because I had always strived to make myself stronger just like she had. But, why did she think that she needed to leave in order to become stronger? 

"Please, don't disappoint me, my little pets," my thoughts were interrupted when I heard King Priapism's voice and I saw a cloud of blue smoke surround the unicorn parents. I watched as they disappeared in front of me. The father appeared to be delighted, while the mother appeared to be nervous and sad. I guessed that the father cared more about our king than his own daughter, while the mother cared more about her daughter than the king.

"Graze, prepare a plate of cookies for the sweet little girl and think about what you will say to her when you apologize," Graze bowed his head respectfully to King Priapism, and then he walked out of the room. When he left, the only ones in the room were me and King Priapism. The greatest of all unicorns, and the greatest of all dragons.

"Sir Phobos, there was a reason for my visit. I have a job for you," my ears perked up and I grinned. King Priapism's jobs were always amusing. My greatest joy in life was to be King Priapism's little soldier, wearing my armor and killing whoever he asked me to kill.

"As you know, I haven't had very much success domesticating dragons. Most colonies would rather live like savages in the wild, rather than live in comfortable settlements like unicorns," I nodded my head in agreement.

"You also know that not every unicorn has been as cooperative as the unicorns in London. If I recall correctly, Tanin'iver tried to attack this colony a week ago," I smiled as I thought of the black-coated bitch. She commanded an army of zombie dragons who posed no threat to a city defended by a great unicorn like me.

However, Telia did admit that her magic was ineffective against the zombie dragons and begged for my help. I said that I would only help if she returned to London, and she called me a "heartless asshole."

She apparently requested the help of a heroic dragon and the town was spared the fate of being destroyed by Tanin'iver. But, the hate-filled black-coat still tried to destroy towns and cities, particularly those that were connected to me. It seemed like she was obsessed with me and my sister, for some reason, yet she had never attempted to explain to me why I was important to her.

King Priapism refused to help any city that Tanin'iver attacked which wasn't under his control, which served as incentive for a number of unicorn settlements to beg King Priapism to be their king.

"Now, Sir Phobos, you might consider this to be a little bit crazy," I was anticipating hearing him say something wonderful. Whenever he said something like that, it usually meant that I would get to do something fun.

"I want to burn the planet so that only two colonies remain. Earth will be called New Eden, Vanhoover will be called New Eve, and London will be called New Adam," King Priapism seemed so proud of himself. "Any creature outside of New Adam or New Eve will be burned by the cleansing flames."

I was astounded. "King Priapism, you're talking about genocide," King Priapism nodded his head. "You're talking about killing millions of unicorns and dragons. Why?" I wondered if King Priapism thought that the big smile on my face was inappropriate. I yearned for battle, I craved war, years of living in luxury had only made me appreciate battle all the more. When I was fighting, I could let the beast inside of me free, everything that I was taught to suppress could be unleashed when I was fighting.

When I was younger, when I was far more crazy, I did terrible things. I couldn't control myself, I killed and ate so many unicorns. Some nights I would wake up and I feel as though I could taste their blood on my tongue.

"Sir Phobos, I'm so tired of trying to gain control of every colony one at a time. Today, I tried to gain control of the wonderful kishunimaras, but they killed themselves as they tried to determine who would gain absolute power once their leader was dead," King Priapism's eyes darkened. "I'm tired of these selfish creatures, I'm tired of being rejected. I think that the best thing to do would be to start fresh."

I was so excited. I had begged for King Priapism to do something like that before, but he always had hope that he could get every sapient creature to be subservient to him. Years of failing to accomplish his goal appeared to have changed him and broken him to some extent. He no longer had any hope that he would ever achieve his goal unless he did something drastic, and that made him far more dangerous than he had been before.

Maybe my sister would return to London if she had nowhere else to go. The thought of a happy reunion with my sister made me giddy with excitement.

"Sir Phobos, I just want to know if this is the right thing to do. You're one of my best friends, my most loyal subject, and a trusted advisor. I value your opinion above all others," I was flattered by his words and I beamed with pride.

"King Priapism, I think that this is a wonderful idea," King Priapism glared at me and I felt myself regret what I had said. Did he not want me to support his plan?

"You think that it's a wonderful idea for the wrong reasons. I want nothing more than for all of the creatures of the world to be happy and live in peace. I believe that peace can only be achieved if I am in control of all of the sapient creatures in the world," King Priapism turned his head away from me.

"If these creatures are allowed to have freedom, they will kill each other in order to take away everyone else's freedom. I can't allow that to happen," King Priapism turned his head to face me again and I was given the opportunity to see the stony expression on his face.

"I know that I have done some terrible things, as have you. I've killed so many dragons and so many unicorns and..." King Priapism was beginning to cry.

"I just don't want to have to kill anymore. I want to use my abilities to help those who need my help, not kill those who refuse to live in peace under my rule," I wasn't really listening too hard to what my king was saying because I was too fascinated by the bright pink tears falling down from his face onto my floor. I contemplated how I wouldn't need to light a candle in the room later because the bright pink glowing tears were providing more than enough light.

I absent-mindedly wondered if any of his other bodily fluids glowed in the dark. Maybe his blood or his semen glowed just like his tears. It amused me to think about a dragon using his own semen as a light in a dark place. That would probably be the stupidest thing in the world.

"This will be the last time I'll ever kill anyone. After this, the only creatures alive will be under my command. The creatures of the world will finally be happy and live in peace," I frowned but I nodded my head in agreement anyway. I liked conflict, I liked fighting in epic battles with my army, and I wasn't so sure that I would like a truly peaceful world.

But, I told myself that I would never love Telia, and I was wrong then. I was also wrong when I told myself that I would never find myself hating her once I had loved her. Love was such a complicated thing, even though I hated Telia for leaving me, part of me still loved her and wished that we were together again.

"King Priapism, I know the value of controlling the populace better than anyone else. I know what happens when a colony isn't controlled by a strong leader," I remembered when I first gained real power in the city of London. The former king only gave me power so that I could act as his loyal attack dog.

I remembered slaughtering hundreds of rebels who wanted to overthrow the monarchy and establish a democracy in the city with elected leaders rather than appointed leaders. Women, children, white-coats, purple-coats, I didn't care who I slaughtered. If they represented a threat to the monarchy they needed to be killed.

"Peace through control," King Priapism muttered to himself. There was a bit of a tense silence between us as Priapism appeared to be deep in thought and I didn't want to say anything to potentially anger him or disturb him.

"I'm going to send about 500 unicorns to this city and I need you to provide accommodations for them," I would probably get Graze to work on that little assignment. As annoying as the dragon could be, it was nice to have him around when there were jobs I didn't want to do.

A cloud of red smoke appeared beside King Priapism. The purple-coated mother of Dusk appeared standing beside her daughter in the smoke. Dusk was smiling uneasily as she held her little cloth doll that somewhat resembled Telia.

Dusk gently placed the little doll on the floor. "King Priapism," the little unicorn turned her head to look at her mother who was attempting to smile in a reassuring way. "I, umm, well, mommy says that the best thing for me is t-to," she was hesitating. Her mother placed her hoof on her shoulder, but it didn't seem to make her any less nervous. Her mother's touch seemed to serve as a harsh reminder of what she was going to give up.

"I-I-I, I want to be stronger!" She shouted defiantly. "I want to be smarter, I want to be the best, just like Telia! But, I also want my toys, my books, and my mommy with me," I saw something dark in King Priapism's face as he stared at the unicorn. Dusk seemed to lose all of her previous confidence and she seemed to shrink as King Priapism stared at her.

"My mother didn't want me. She threw me into the ocean when I was born then she walked away. She thought that I would drown," a cloud of blue smoke appeared around King Priapism as he spoke.

"I never had toys or books or a mother, Telia never had a mother either," King Priapism briefly turned his head to face me just to see my reaction to what he had said. I scowled at him and he smiled before he turned away from me to continue his monologue to the young unicorn.

"I always believed that somehow the lack of a mother made me stronger. Seeing you makes me wonder if I became stronger in spite of my mother abandoning me, not because my mother abandoned me," that was a sensitive subject for King Priapism. It took me a long time before I gained King Priapism's trust and he confided in me about his past.

Unlike unicorns, dragons were born with some of the information that was in their mother's brain. So, while unicorns were born unable to speak or search for food, dragons were born knowing how to hunt, how to talk, how to walk, as well as a few other essential things. When they were born they were usually too weak to be able to hunt, but at least they knew how to hunt.

When King Priapism was born he knew how to swim and he knew how to speak. So, when his mother tossed him into the ocean he was able to swim to shore safely. He was also able to cry out for his mother to explain to him why she had tried to drown him.

"Darling Dusk, if you feel as though you need your mommy to make you stronger, then you can bring her with you," the eyes of the unicorn literally lit up with happiness. The red glow of her eyes was a bit unsettling, and it reminded me of a group of demonic bat-like creatures that I remembered battling years ago when I was just a young soldier.

"Thank you! Gee, you're so much nicer than I thought you were. I mean, no offence, but you seem a bit-" King Priapism's glare was enough to make Dusk lose any desire to finish her sentence.

"I shall see you tomorrow, my darling little prodigy. Pack whatever you need and be ready for me," he turned to face me. "The unicorns will be arriving here tomorrow, I hope that you'll have accommodations ready by then," I nodded my head. It wouldn't be too hard to find somewhere for all those unicorns to sleep comfortably. Even if it was, Graze would handle it, not me.

"Wait, before you go, I have a question about, umm, magic," Dusk smiled uneasily. "This is, umm, a question that Telia didn't answer in her book, so maybe you can a-answer it," Dusk seemed nervous, which was understandable. Even an apparent magical prodigy like her was insignificant in comparison to King Priapism.

"Ask whatever you want, my beautiful apprentice. My greatest desire is to educate and nurture you," Dusk seemed to relax slightly. King Priapism's calming voice seemed to be able to calm unicorns pretty easily. "Well, umm, Telia said that her magic doesn't affect zombies, is that true?" King Priapism nodded his head and Dusk's eyes widened.

"Why? Why doesn't it affect them?" King Priapism frowned, and after a moment of tense silence he decided to answer Dusk's question.

"Centuries ago, before the humans discovered a way to use our blue magic, they tried to use a bastardized version of our magic called black magic," Dusk appeared to be about to ask a question, but King Priapism held up his talons as a way of telling her to be quiet.

"Black magic is magic without any connection to life. Black magic is to magic what a corpse is without a soul. It is empty, it is meaningless, and even after centuries of studying it no one really understands it," Dusk seemed fascinated by the topic, while I couldn't care less. How magic worked didn't matter to me at all.

"It's been centuries since the humans died, and if it wasn't for our blue magic that they stole, their pathetic plastic contraptions would have been destroyed by the passage of time while the trees would have remained on the Earth forevermore," I felt as though I had completely missed some of what King Priapism had said. As much as I adored my king, I couldn't stop myself from being too bored to pay attention to what he was saying when he talked about magic.

"Are you saying that no matter how strong I get I'll never be able to use my magic to fight monsters?" I guessed that I missed more of the conversation. It was nice to know that no matter how strong she became, I would always be able to kill zombie dragons, and she would never be able to. I would always be able to do something that she couldn't. 

King Priapism shook his head. "Beautiful little Dusk, the first thing you need to learn is that friendship and loyalty are invaluable. Sir Phobos will always be able to protect you from the wicked zombies, just like Telia's dragon friends will protect her from the zombies. You have nothing to fear as long as you have someone to protect you," King Priapism smiled at the young unicorn. If the great King Priapism wanted me to protect Dusk, then I would make sure that she was protected at all times. I had no love or respect for the little unicorn, but my loyalty to King Priapism was absolute.

"I'm looking forward to teaching you," I watched as the familiar cloud of blue smoke appeared around King Priapism and he seemed to fade away from existence. He vanished quickly, which left me alone in the room with Dusk and her mother.

"Umm, Sir Phobos, can I ask a question?" I growled at the little unicorn and reluctantly nodded my head.

"King Priapism said that Telia didn't have a mother. Do you know what happened to her?" I thought about lying to the little unicorn about what happened to Telia's mother. But, perhaps it might be better to tell her the truth. I didn't want her to like me, I wanted her to fear me and understand what I was capable of doing.

_ "Please don't tell her the truth,"  _ I heard King Priapism's voice in my head and I frowned.

"Telia's mother died when she was young, and I brought her into my home. I took care of her just like a brother should," I wasn't lying to the unicorn, I was just omitting a little bit of information. The unicorn turned her head away from me and stared at the little doll lying on the floor.

"It's so sad that Telia didn't have a mommy," Dusk said quietly to herself. "I know that I would be sad if I didn't have a mommy," Dusk picked up the doll with her mouth and I watched as a cloud of blue smoke appeared around her and her mother.

"Gudwye ir hobos," Dusk's voice was muffled by the doll in her mouth. Soon she was gone, and I was alone in the room.

"Graze!" I shouted. I heard a crash from somewhere in my home. It sounded like something metal, perhaps a cup or a bowl, had fallen onto the floor. One of my servants would clean it up, so I didn't need to worry about it.

Graze ran into the room. "Sir Phobos, what do you want me to do?" Graze hurriedly bowed in front of me as a sign of respect and submission.

"King Priapism is sending 500 unicorns to the city, I need you to find a place to put them all," Graze nodded his head. "500 unicorns? That might be a bit of a challenge, but I can do it," Graze turned his head away from me and started walking away.

"Graze, stop," the dragon paused and spun around to face me. "Before you do that, I need you to prepare my armor," Graze nodded his head.

"Yes, Sir Phobos," Graze turned around and walked out of the room. I was completely alone in the room with my thoughts. I was finally allowed to relax after the stressful ordeal that I had gone through.

I allowed my body to go limp as I sat on my throne. "Fuck fuck fuck shit bitch cunt," I growled to myself. My eyes were already starting to feel a bit heavy and I thought about taking a nice long nap. But, I couldn't take a long nap because I had work to do. 

"Maybe just a short nap," I said to myself as I allowed my heavy eyelids to cover my eyes so that I could see only darkness.

\---

"Fear me," I could hear the melodic voice of the mentally-disabled black-scaled dragon in the basement polishing and maintaining my master's armor. Reaper might not have been a very smart creature, but that didn't matter to Sir Phobos.

The mysterious dragon had appeared one day with a blue pigeon sitting happily on his shoulder. He had been carrying a suit of armor with a note on it that explained who he was and what he wanted.

_ Sir Phobos, my name is Reaper and this is my pet, Sabrina. We want to live in peace in your wonderful city as your devoted servants. Please, accept this gift. _

Sir Phobos did accept their gift, and he allowed them to live in his home mainly because Reaper was the only creature who knew how to maintain the armor that he had given to him. He also kept him around because he needed to feel like he was smart and strong. Reaper was a very small and weak mentally-disabled dragon, so he definitely made Sir Phobos feel strong and intelligent when he compared himself to the dragon.

I knocked on the wooden hatch. I heard Sabrina yelp, and I heard what sounded like a glass cup falling onto the ground. If Reaper had broken a glass, I knew that I would have to clean up the mess or suffer the wrath of Sir Phobos.

The hatch opened and the black-scaled dragon greeted me with a dopey smile on his face.

"Fear me!" The creature greeted me happily using the only two words that he was able to say. I knew that he was a little bit smarter than he allowed the unicorns in the city to believe he was, and I didn't understand why he could only say those two words. Even the stupidest unicorn in the city could say more than two words.

"Erm, hello Reaper. I hope that you're having a wonderful and productive day," Reaper happily nodded his head.

"Fear me, fear me," Reaper stated. I nodded my head and pretended that I understood what he said. It must have been so hard for him to attempt to communicate with dragons and unicorns with his strange mental disability.

"Umm, Reaper. Is Sir Probos's armor ready for him to use?" Reaper happily nodded his head and ran down the stairs expecting me to follow him. I slowly walked down the stairs into the basement where Reaper lived and worked.

The basement wasn't very big, but it didn't need to be. The only things that were in the room were my master's suit of armor, a small bed where Reaper slept and a tiny tree in a pot where Sabrina would roost. It was a cozy little room, but I wouldn't want to live there.

"Fear me," Reaper pointed at the suit of white armor. He had the same dopey smile on his face that he always had when he added something new, so I scanned the suit of armor to see if there was anything noticeably different about it.

The metal dragon talons, that Sir Phobos would control using his mind as though they were an extension of his body, were unchanged from the last time I saw them. Sir Phobos once confided in me that he adored the talons above all of the other features on the suit, because before he had the suit he wished that he had actual talons like dragons had, instead of his hooves.

The wings on the back of the suit were unchanged as well. The helmet looked the same as it had always looked, and the breastplate still had the same image of a dragon's skull. The only thing that I could see that was different was...

"Umm, Reaper, what is this?" I pointed at the piece of armor that seemed to have been made to cover the tail of my master. Reaper grinned and proudly stroked the tail armor with his claws. I watched in amazement as the bit of armor seemed to become engulfed in fire.

"Sir Phobos is going to adore this," I stared at the flaming tail in awe and the black-scaled dragon grinned.

"Fear me," Reaper said proudly.

\---

_ Dear Deimos Phobos _

_ Against the wishes of the king I decided to bring my scribe aboard the ship. The young dragon is stupid, but he's hard-working and he has proven useful during the journey. I don't trust him to prepare my food, but I trust him to keep my living space clean. _

_ But, I'm not writing this letter to you to talk about my scribe, nor am I writing this letter to you simply to inform you of the details of our mission. _

_ I am writing this letter to inform you of the worrying condition of your son, Artemis Phobos. I am worried about his mental state. _

_ I think that you will be proud to know that your son was the only surviving member of his army. He was a strong fighter who refused to give up even when it seemed like he couldn't win the battle. The many deaths he witnessed galvanized him. He murdered a dragon, he used the skull of the dragon as a helmet, and he slaughtered the entire opposing unicorn army. _

_ However, it seemed like a part of his mind broke. When he returned from the city he wasn't the same unicorn that I had known since he was just a little child. He was different. _

_ The crew discovered that during the time he spent in the city he had murdered the unicorn women and children he was supposed to bring back. But, that's not the most worrying part. Apparently, your son developed a taste for unicorn flesh. _

_ I lost 3 members of my crew to Artemis's appetite. He sleepwalks at night and when he wants a midnight snack he devours a crew member. None of my crew are trained soldiers, and none of my crew are strong enough to fight him. We've started tying him to his bed when he sleeps so that he doesn't sleepwalk, but sometimes that isn't enough to restrain him. _

_ Deimos, I fear as though your son might either be the greatest asset that our military has, or the greatest liability in our military. I've been trying to evaluate him for the past few days, and I'm still not sure about his mental state. I know that he's broken, but I don't know if it's possible to repair his shattered mind. _

_ What worries me the most about this situation is that I'm not sure if I want to repair him if it means that we'll lose what he has become. This new Artemis is strong enough to fight an entire army by himself, and he's ruthless enough to be the most effective torturer in our military. Artemis was a gentle soul before he entered the city, but after he left he became someone completely different. _

_ In fact, he has violently attacked a number of crew members for referring to him as Artemis. He claims that Artemis died in the city, and that he wants us to refer to him using his new name. _

_ Deimos, in two days we shall dock and you will get to see Sir Phobos. My scribe shall fly to you to deliver this letter of warning. I do not feel as though I can properly make a decision about what to do about your son, so I shall pass that burden onto you, his father. _

_ I will not judge you no matter what course of action you plan to take, but I will suggest a number of different options available to you. _

_ The first option is to kill him. It sounds cruel, but I suspect that he is dealing with severe trauma and that a part of him wants to be put out of his misery. A quick and painless death could prevent future hardship for both him as well as many others. _

_ The second option is to fix his shattered mind, which I suspect can only be achieved with years of therapy, or with a few hours of magic. However, I fear as though once we have fixed his mind it will still be cracked, and that no matter what we do we shall never truly have Artemis back. _

_ The third option is to do nothing and allow him to rise up through the ranks in the military until he inevitably becomes the commander. I believe that with Sir Phobos as an ally, London will eventually conquer the entire world. With Artemis as an ally, I fear that we will only succeed in allowing more of our soldiers to die on failed missions. _

_ Deimos, I know that this will be difficult for you to accept, but your son died on this mission, and Sir Phobos is all that remains of what your son was. He is a sadistic cannibal who will murder you and eat your flesh if you anger him. _

_ However, a part of him is still the unicorn with a heart of gold. When he entered the ship he was carrying a baby hermaphrodite dragon. He treats it like a mother would treat a newborn baby. However, the baby dragon was born with a mental disability and I fear as though the baby won't survive for more than a year. When the dragon dies, I feel as though Artemis will die as well.  _

_ Deimos, I don't know what you will do when Sir Phobos enters the city of London, but I believe that it is in the best interest of everyone to make sure that the hermaphrodite lives for as long as possible. I believe that there is a small amount of light within Sir Phobos, and it will be extinguished as soon as the hermaphrodite dragon dies. _

_ These are my final words about this situation. _

_ I have been a soldier, a captain, a father, and a grandfather. I have seen death, suffering and all of the worst things about this terrible world. I believe that I have seen many truly evil creatures throughout my long life and before Sir Phobos walked onto my boat I thought that nothing could scare me. _

_ As soon as I looked into his cold eyes and saw the darkness that existed within him, I whimpered to myself because I knew that I was looking into the soul of a truly evil unicorn. I knew that if I did anything to anger him he wouldn't kill me, he would torture and torment me until I was a weeping pile of bones, flesh and fluids lying on the floor begging the deity of creation to murder me. _

_ Deimos, I need you to understand that Sir Phobos is no longer your son, he is a weapon and he should be treated as though he is a weapon. _

_ Best Regards, _

_ Captain Lavender. _

\---

_ Dear Captain Lavender _

_ I created a monster, a destroyer of worlds, because my mistress, Tanin'iver, predicted that a terrible creature would enter London. We needed to turn my beloved son into a monster in order to save our species. _

_ I told the unicorns in the city that the army was going to invade them, months before you set sail. They had time to prepare enough traps and train enough of their warriors to decimate the entire army. _

_ But, I knew that my son was strong enough to survive. I also knew that there was a dark part of him screaming within his soul, begging to be released onto the world. That creature, Sir Phobos, is a wicked creature who might someday be the unicorn who saves us all. _

_ I appreciate your concern, and I thank you for ferrying my son back to me. I will provide compensation for the unicorns you lost during your journey. _

_ Sincerely, _

_ Deimos Phobos. _

\---

_ Dear Artemis Phobos _

_ I know that somewhere inside of you there is still a unicorn with a heart of gold who never wanted to join the military. I'm sorry, if I hadn't forced you to enlist then maybe you would have done what you had always wanted to do.  _

_ When you were a young unicorn you wanted to be a doctor and cure all of the unicorns of their ailments. You wanted to make everyone happy when you were Artemis Phobos, but now, you just want everyone to feel as miserable as you feel, and it's all my fault. _

_ I can't watch you hurt the unicorns you're supposed to lead, and I can't watch you destroy yourself anymore. You probably don't even realize that you're hurting yourself when you alienate everyone who ever loved you. You hurt me, you hurt your mother, and you will hurt your sister if you ever get close to her. _

_ I found your mother with a noose around her neck. She killed herself because she didn't want to live in the same world as a monster like you. She knows about what you've done, and unlike you, she wasn't able to repress a single memory. You probably don't even remember when you denied food to the unicorns in that town in Africa. You laughed when you saw the parents eating their own children. _

_ But, you had to torture them just a bit more, you sick fuck. When there were only two unicorns left in that deityforsaken town you made them kill each other for a reward. The reward you offered was a bowl of insects. _

_ One unicorn killed the other unicorn and his reward was the opportunity to watch the insects burrow their way out of his stomach. _

_ Why did you do it? Why did you torment those poor unicorns? _

_ I know why. I created a monster when I sacrificed my son. Ever since you returned home and I realized that Sir Phobos had murdered my son, there hasn't been a single minute that I haven't regretted what I did. Artemis, if there is any part of you that's alive inside of that body, I want you to know that I'm truly sorry. _

_ You probably won't even acknowledge that you drove your mother to suicide. You'll probably blame me for her suicide. You'll think that she killed herself because I impregnated another unicorn. _

_ The truth is that, yes, I have been involved in a relationship with another unicorn for many years. I never hid this information from your mother, only from you. She accepted our affair as long as I was honest with her about everything that we did. In her eyes, it wasn't a bad thing that I could love two different unicorns. _

_ But, you are not your mother. You never would have accepted my mistress, and I know that you will hurt your little sister if you are allowed to be a part of her life. Sir Phobos, I don't want you to ever see Telia, I want you to stay as far away from her as possible. The further you are from her, the safer that you will be. _

_ This hurts me. Every time that I tell Telia that there are no monsters lurking in the shadows waiting to kill her I will be lying, because I know that you exist. I created you, and when I saw what you were capable of, I knew that I had murdered my son and replaced him with a weapon. _

_ That's all that you are, a weapon used by King Priapism. You obey your leader without question, which is something that I admire, but when you're not obeying orders all that you can do is hurt innocent creatures. You are a monster, and I know I've said this before, but I hate what you've become. I hate myself for allowing you to become what you are. _

_ If Artemis Phobos ever returns, I will embrace him and apologize for what I've done to him. I will introduce him to his sister, my daughter, and we will live together as a happy family. But, I promise that Sir Phobos shall only be allowed near my daughter if I am unable to protect her. _

_ Artemis, I know that you still exist, and I hope that before I die I can see you again. Please, rid the world of the evil that is Sir Phobos, then heal the world like you wanted to do. Become the doctor you wanted to be when you were a child, not the soldier that I forced you to be. I never stopped loving you, Artemis, but I've never loved Sir Phobos. I would gladly give up my life, as well as every second that I've ever been alive, if I could just have one more second where I could hug my beloved Artemis and tell him that I'm sorry. _

_ With love, _

_ Deimos Phobos _

\---

_ Dear Deimos _

_ Artemis is dead. He's been dead for years, and nothing that you say will ever bring him back. I will find you, and I will kill you. Before you die, I will kill everyone that you have ever loved. I will kill your precious daughter and your mistress. I know that somehow this letter will reach you before I do, and you'll spend the rest of your life anticipating your inevitable death. I am the greatest soldier who ever lived. There is nowhere that you could possibly go to hide from me. _

_ Sincerely, _

_ Sir Phobos _

_ P.S. Thank you for creating me, father. _

  
  



	10. The Book of Oryps: Chapter 11 - King Priapism

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I finally finished this chapter. I had to get really stoned to put me in a good enough mood to finish editing this monster of a chapter. I've been detaching myself from a lot of things, lately, trying to put myself in something of a bubble.

I am King Priapism.

When I was born I was deformed. I had four horns on my head instead of the usual two and one of my eyes was completely blind. My wings were too misshapen to ever allow me to fly, and the bones in my arms were brittle. I could only walk on my hind legs because my arms weren't strong enough to support the weight of my body if I walked like a normal dragon.

My mother assumed that the deity of creation had punished her by making her child so deformed. She believed that she was performing a noble act when she tossed me into the ocean and left me to die.

Unlike unicorns, dragons were never born as idiots. Well, some dragons were born stupid, but they weren't idiots like unicorns. All of us were born knowing how to speak, knowing how to hunt, and knowing a number of essential skills. Our mothers were supposed to set their children free into the world to survive and thrive.

If I had been a unicorn I would have drowned in the ocean. Instead, I pleaded with my mother to let me live, but she didn't care about a deformed baby dragon. She watched me sink to the bottom of the ocean, she watched as I screamed and begged for help. Then, when I had sunk below the water, she walked away.

I kicked my legs when I was in the ocean and I swam for the first time in my life. I swam to the beach and I pulled myself onto the sand with my broken arms. I was alone, I was scared and I was vulnerable. It was a miracle that nothing tried to kill me as I crawled.

I knew that I wouldn't be able to hunt for food because of my broken arms. So, I just ate whatever I could find on the beach. Crabs, as well as fish that had washed up on the sand, were what I ended up feasting upon. I felt like a useless scavenger, and once I had eaten enough to sustain my existence I cried.

I cried for many hours and I begged the deity of creation to end my life somehow. I wanted to be struck by lightning, I wanted to be eaten by a predator, I wanted a tidal wave to drown me.

When I was done crying, I crawled back to the water to drown myself. But, my body refused to allow me to go towards the water. The cloud of blue smoke that had become so familiar to me surrounded my body and prevented me from moving.

The smoke fixed the broken bones in my arms, and it also hardened my brittle bones. I was perplexed at the strange blue smoke and I was a bit frightened of it.

I realized that the blue smoke was a gift that the mythical deity had given to me. My deformed horns, my blind eye, my brittle bones, all of those weaknesses were given to me because the deity gave me the greatest strength she could possibly give me.

The deity gave me my power for a reason. I convinced myself that the reason why I was given my power was because I was destined to control all of the creatures in the world. I was destined to be the king of every tribe.

For the next century, I trained as much as I could and studied every text left behind by the humans that offered me any insight as to how I could use my power. I became stronger, I became smarter and eventually I decided that I had become strong enough. I needed to conquer the world.

I first tried to conquer the colony of dragons that my mother had belonged to. I showed them my power and demanded that they obey my commands. The fools refused to obey me and their queen refused to step down as ruler.

So, I killed the queen, but the dragons then fought amongst themselves over who would be the next ruler instead of obeying me. I was shocked and appalled by the bloodshed. Brothers, sisters, fathers, mothers, friends, they all killed each other.

I destroyed them all, just as Sodom was destroyed by the angels in the time of the humans. I knew then that only righteous creatures would accept me as their leader. However, the planet had become so corrupted with evil that the righteous creatures had become a minority. I would need to slaughter many creatures in order to find the righteous creatures who I would rule over.

I was surprised to discover that the first righteous creature who ever obeyed me was a brilliant and talented warrior named Sir Phobos. He was young when I met him, but he was already a high-ranking soldier in the colony of unicorns in London. I spoke with the leaders of the colony and only Sir Phobos agreed to allow me to rule over him.

I slaughtered them all and I chose Sir Phobos to be my representative in London while I travelled to other unicorn colonies. Over the next few years, I travelled to many unicorn colonies. Not all of them accepted me as their ruler, but enough of them did to satisfy me.

I met Vein when I travelled to Vanhoover. I didn't take over the city at the time because I didn't think that the colony was large enough to be ruled over. The population of the city was pretty small when I became its ruler, but it continued to grow at a steady pace throughout my rule.

After I met Vein, we spent a short amount of time searching for dragon colonies for me to rule. Sadly, I had to slaughter almost every dragon colony we discovered.

We later travelled to a city that appeared to be uninhabited. We explored the city and encountered Greed, my adopted son.

When I discovered him he was as deformed as I had been when I was a baby, and he was just as powerful as I was. I knew that he needed a father who knew exactly what he was going through.

Vein was excited about the idea of being a mother and she convinced me to travel back to Vanhoover. I selected a large apartment suite and we moved into the suite as a family. Vanhoover became my home, the first home that I ever really had.

Conquering the city was easy, the dragons were so spineless that I barely even needed to use my powers. I chose my representative for the city and I spent the next 20 years living quietly. I ruled over a large number of unicorn colonies and a few dragon colonies. Life was comfortable, and I remembered thinking that the world would be a much better place if every colony was under my rule just like those colonies were.

It was painful for both of us when Vein fell in love with Dolphina. Vein was never my mate, but I had always felt a lot of affection towards her. I had always looked at her as a friend or a sister. I was happy to hear that she had found a creature to love.

When Dolphina was killed the Vein that I loved died. She became a dark creature obsessed with revenge, fantasizing about the day when she would murder the creature whom Aishiteru loved the most.

She tried to murder the dragon who Aishiteru loved, but she didn't succeed. The dragon who Aishiteru loved was sitting beside me on the couch trying her best to enjoy watching one of the old human movies.

Vein wasn't watching the movie, she was only pretending to watch it. I knew that in her mind she was thinking about what she had done and she was thinking about the future that her and Dolphina could have together. She felt guilty about what she had done and who she had allowed herself to become. I could only hope that she would eventually return to being who she used to be.

"It's kind of funny, baby," Ambrosia said. "I've always wanted to be here, baby. I've always wanted to sit on a couch watching movies, baby. But now that I'm here, I don't like it as much as I thought I would, baby."

"It's because Aishiteru is dead," Vein whispered. "You wanted to watch movies with Aishiteru, the dragon you loved most," Ambrosia sadly nodded her head.

"It isn't just Aishiteru, it's all of my friends, baby. Well, actually, I just had one friend. His name was Oryps, baby," Ambrosia's lip quivered. She wiped a tear from her eye with her arm.

"Both of them sacrificed their lives to save me, baby. I'm just not sure if I'm worthy of what they did, baby. Why was I so special, baby?" Guilt was truly a terrible thing. It haunted me every time I allowed myself to think about the numerous dragons that I had murdered over the years.

"I'm, ah, going for a swim, baby. I need to clear my mind, baby," the dragon rolled off of the couch and landed on the ground in an undignified manner. I saw Vein wince as she watched the crippled dragon pathetically crawl towards the pool.

"Would you like some help?" Vein asked the dragon. Ambrosia scoffed rudely, which was understandable. I definitely didn't want to accept help from my mother when she had left me to die in the ocean.

"I think you've done enough, baby," her cold words froze the heart of my friend. Vein scowled and lifted her little plush appendage. I watched as a cloud of blue smoke surrounded Ambrosia, which prevented her from moving away from the angry plush toy.

"I didn't need to save you. I could have let you die in that cave," Vein floated in front of Ambrosia's face and looked directly into her eyes.

"I don't even remember you thanking me," Vein hissed. The dragon growled, but she remained still in the smoke, unable to move a single muscle to attack my dear friend.

"Why would I thank you, baby?" Ambrosia asked. "You killed Aishiteru, baby."

"Aishiteru killed herself because I tried to kill you. You should be dead right now," the two of them glared at each other. I looked outside the window and I saw that Dolphina was sleeping in the pool. I was glad that Dolphina wouldn't see how the situation would be resolved.

"I won't thank you for being incompetent, baby," something snapped in Vein's mind. Her eyes narrowed and darkened. She lifted her plush appendage and Ambrosia gasped. The dragon struggled to breathe within the smoke as Vein watched her choke.

"You ungrateful bitch. Maybe you'll appreciate your life once you're dead," I wanted to intervene, but I remained silent. I focused entirely on the tv screen and I turned up the volume to drown out the sound of the dragon asphyxiating.

"Think... Of... Dolphina..." Ambrosia struggled to choke out every word. I didn't turn my head away from the tv screen to see what happened, but I could hear the sound of something heavy dropping to the ground which I assumed must have been the dragon. I guessed that Vein either decided to spare her life or the dragon had finally died.

I remembered that when I strangled my mother I made the mistake of thinking that she was dead after she stopped breathing. I could remember being shocked when I learned that she had simply passed out. I was so young, so stupid, and so angry at her for what she had done to me. I thought that since she had tried to kill me I should try to kill her.

"Why would she care about a bitch like you?" I could hear Ambrosia's harsh breathing as she struggled to fill her lungs with as much air as possible.

"I know I'm a bitch, baby. But, I'm not worth it, baby. Don't sacrifice everything about you that Dolphina loves just because you hate me, baby," I turned my head to see how Vein was reacting to what Ambrosia had said. It was something that she needed to hear, but I was always too afraid to tell her.

"I've already succumbed to the darkness, it's too late for me to go back to the light," Ambrosia shook her head. "No it isn't, baby. It's never too late to step back into the light, baby," Ambrosia softly extended her talons as an offer of friendship.

"I'm going to go for a swim, baby. I'd really like it if you joined me, baby," Vein stared at her talons, unsure of whether or not she would accept or decline the invitation.

"Please, baby. I want to be in the light, baby. I know it must have been hard for you to lose the one you love, baby, just like it's hard for me. But, I know that you can still be good, because you regret what you've done, baby," Ambrosia's talons remained extended, and Vein still refused to touch her.

"Ambrosia, I..." a tear formed in Vein's synthetic eye. "I shouldn't have brought you here, this was just a big mistake. All of this was a big mistake," Vein turned to me and allowed me to look directly into her teary eyes. I could see all of her despair, all of her doubt, and a longing for something. She wanted me to do something, but I couldn't guess what she wanted.

"Priapism, you need to take away my power before I do something else that I'll regret," I shook my head. She knew as well as I did that her power was what was keeping her alive. If I took away her power she would be nothing but a lifeless corpse.

"Vein, power is a burden that the strong must carry. I won't take that burden away from you," Vein floated towards me and her tears dripped onto the floor. I noticed that Ambrosia was already crawling to the pool. She stepped through the open door just as Vein floated directly in front of my face.

"Priapism, I'm not like you. This strength is... I just... I don't know how to use my power to make the world a better place! I'm not like you, and I don't want to be. Please, just take my power and use it wisely. Use it better than I did," Vein turned her head away from me. "You deserve my power more than me."

"What about Greed?" Vein sadly shook her head.

"I love Greed, I love Dolphina, and I love you. But, love is blinding. Love is what made me sink into the darkness. I'm afraid that my love for Greed will eventually make me fall further into the darkness," I reached out my talon and stroked her cheek. I needed to console her because I was afraid that she would do something terrible if I didn't.

"Do you not think that he'll walk down a dark path when his mother is dead?" Vein was being selfish, she was only thinking about what was best for herself. She was not even considering the effect her death would have on the creatures that she loved.

"He's a strong kid with a good heart. As long as you're honest with him about what happens to me, I know he'll be okay. He won't sink into the darkness like I have," Vein turned her head to face me.

"Please, I need you to do this for the good of everyone. I can't let myself continue to live anymore as long as I have this darkness inside of me," Vein pleaded with me to murder her but I couldn't bring myself to do it. We had been friends for so many years and I didn't want to live the rest of my life without her.

"Vein, are you sure that you want this? Are you absolutely sure?" Vein nodded her head.

"Priapism, if you had my power you could truly make the world a better place. You could reshape the entire world into something truly wonderful. You could probably replace the moon with my face so that every time Greed looks to the sky at night he could see me looking down at him," Vein smiled sweetly at me and I took the time to memorize every detail in her smiling face. That was how I wanted to remember her, as a happy friend with a smile that illuminated the darkness in my soul.

"Please, end my life, I've lived for long enough," she reached out the only arm on her body that she could move and she stroked my talons.

"Priapism, the Vein that you love has been dead for years. You're not murdering her, you're just disposing of her corpse," she wasn't making me feel any better.

"Vein..." I gripped her arm tightly. "Vein, I don't want to lose you."

"Priapism, you'll lose me if I stay alive. Trust me, it's better this way," Her conviction was clear. If I didn't kill her, she would kill herself. No matter what happened, I knew that I'd lose her somehow before the night was over.

"Vein, do you want to say goodbye to anyone before you... You know..." Vein shook her head.

"Dolphina and Greed will beg me to stay alive. They just won't understand why I need to die," I understood her view, but I still didn't want her to die. 

"Vein, I love you," Vein smiled and kissed my talons.

"I love you too. Thank you for doing this," I raised my talons and a cloud of blue smoke appeared around my friend. What disturbed me about the situation was that I didn't feel sad or angry about what I was about to do, I just felt numb.

I clenched my talons and I watched as the magic that gave Vein her life flowed from her into me. I watched as her head and arm became limp as everything that made her who she was flowed into my body. She didn't scream, she didn't cry, and to a witness it might have looked like she was falling asleep rather than dying.

When all of the magic within her was gone, I lowered my talons. The blue smoke disappeared and her lifeless body fell to the ground. For a moment I allowed myself to continue feeling numb. For a moment I didn't feel anything at all, and I just stared at the body of my friend as I felt my body adjust to the feeling of having a little bit more magic inside of me.

Then I cried. I cried uncontrollably and shouted nothing at all to no one. I knew that Dolphina, Ambrosia, and everyone else in the building could hear me, but I didn't care. I had just lost my best friend and I needed to react. I needed the whole world to hear my sobs, to feel my pain, to care that the world had just lost someone special.

"The whole world will know that an angel has died. Every time they look at the night sky, they will know what I lost," I picked up the body of my dear friend and held her tightly against my chest.

I walked to the balcony with the body of my friend. I felt the cold night air on my body, and I imagined that the wind was actually the spirit of my friend reassuring me that she was happy in the afterlife.

Dolphina was sleeping in the pool and I would have liked to believe that Ambrosia was sleeping as well, but I knew better. When dragons slept they didn't sleep with their faces submerged in water.

I looked up and saw the white moon floating in the night sky. All dragons hated the moon because it reminded them of the cold night. The sun warmed the scales of a dragon, the moon forced them to cuddle together and hide away just to stay alive.

I lifted my talons in the air and I watched as blue smoke slowly surrounded the moon. I knew that what I was doing was necessary. Vein would have appreciated my effort to immortalize her.

Soon, the moon was completely covered with blue smoke, and I knew that I could begin my work. I clenched my talons and closed my eyes. I thought about what Vein looked like when she would return home after spending an entire day at the beach with Dolphina and Greed.

I could feel the moon being destroyed and replaced by the blue smoke. I smiled as I changed the moon into a memorial for my beloved friend.

Seconds, minutes, perhaps hours passed by as I re-shaped the moon. When I was finished, I unclenched my talons and I opened my eyes to admire my work.

It looked just as beautiful as Vein had been when she was alive. Her smile was the same as it was when she was still living, with the only difference being that her face looked blue. I knew that if Vein were still alive she would have appreciated my memorial.

"She isn't breathing," my thoughts were interrupted by the shaking voice of the dolphin swimming in my pool. I turned my head to watch her prod the floating body of the female dragon.

"Dead dragons don't breathe," I didn't care about the dragon when she was alive, and I didn't care about her when she was dead. All that she was to me was the dragon who Vein was obsessed with murdering and the dragon who had fought with my pet kishunimara.

"Why didn't she want to be with me?" She was referring to my dead friend, not the dragon. "Didn't she love me?"

I was not sure of what I could say to her. I knew that it would be easy to bring her back to life because I still had the turtle. A simple wish from Dolphina would bring Vein back, but it would have been pointless to bring her back because she would probably just kill herself.

"She loved you dearly, that's why she wanted to die. She was afraid of the darkness within her that made her kill and maim those two dragons. She was scared that you wouldn't love her as long as she had darkness within her, and she was afraid that the darkness would make her hurt you," I could tell that she didn't agree with Vein's logic.

"When I died, I wanted to tell Vein not to seek revenge," Dolphina explained. "I saw the darkness awaken within her as she watched me die."

Dolphina stared at the lifeless body of Vein as I held her. She knew that I killed her, I could see it in her eyes. Dolphina had always been a kind-hearted dolphin who could never allow herself to hate anyone or anything. I knew that she didn't hate me for killing Vein, or Vein for asking me to kill her.

She wouldn't sink into the darkness like Vein did, she would remain in the light as long as she could. But, I could tell that she had a heavy heart and a worried mind.

"Dolphina, if there's anything I can do for you, just tell me. I know this must be hard for you," Dolphina shook her head and smiled.

"You don't gotta apologize. Now I know that when I die there will be someone to keep me company," Dolphina started to happily swim around the pool, circling the body of Ambrosia as she did.

"I also have a dragon friend who's dead! Maybe when I die this time I can visit her in the light! Oh, this is just wonderful!" I smiled to myself. Only Dolphina could find a way to be happy about the suicide of two of her friends.

Speaking of suicide...

"Dolphina, I need to know. Are you going to kill yourself?" Dolphina shook her head without a moment of hesitation.

"Of course not! Being dead is boring, being alive is full of fun and colors and, well, creatures care here," my ears perked up when I heard the last part of her sentence.

"Do creatures not care in the afterlife?" Dolphina shook her head. For just a moment her sunny demeanor disappeared and I could see the darkness within her. There was something terrible about the afterlife, something that she didn't want to talk about, something that she didn't want to remember. As curious as I was, I didn't want to ask what that something was.

"I didn't want to tell this to Vein, but, I'm not the same dolphin I was before. Not even a wish could bring me back. Well, not all of me back anyway," she looked like she had come back entirely normal, but I guessed that looks could be deceiving.

"I guess there are three different, erm, parts in all of us. The ego, the self, and the spirit. When we die, the ego and the self die, and nothing can bring them back, they're just gone," I shivered as I felt a chill run down my body. It wasn't good for a dragon like me to be outside in the cold night air.

"The spirit goes to the afterlife, and the spirit is the only part that can come back from the afterlife. I-I-I, I don't feel complete being in this body without my ego or my self. It's hard to explain, but, I feel empty and lonely without those two parts of me," Dolphina nuzzled the corpse of the dragon floating in the pool.

"Can I, umm, keep her?" Dolphina asked. "I know she's, well, dead, but her body is like a bloated, wet, scaly teddy bear. I just want to hug her and squeeze her and love her!" Dolphina happily pushed the dragon's corpse around the pool and I smiled. I wished that I had known her when she had been whole, just like Vein knew her. Maybe then I could have loved her just like Vein had loved her.

"I won't deny you anything that will make you happy, my beautiful pet," Dolphina smiled and stroked the dragon's corpse with her nose.

"Thank you."

\---

I stared at the corpse of the turtle lying on my bed. I had severed the turtle's neck because I didn't want anybody using it against me. I could only make one wish, and I had already used it to bring Dolphina back to life. Greed would never need to use a wish because I would make sure that every one of his wishes would come true.

Well, his wish would probably be to bring his mother back to life, but Vein had told me that she didn't want to be brought back from the afterlife, and according to Dolphina she wouldn't come back the same anyway. As much as it hurt, I needed to accept that Vein was dead and she would never return to the land of the living.

If I gave a wish to Sir Phobos he would probably use his wish to cause a lot of pain to a lot of creatures. He was a trusted friend and a valuable ally, but I knew that his heart was full of darkness. Half of him was a kind-hearted and loyal friend, the other half was a sadistic monster who enjoyed seeing other creatures suffer. I assigned Graze to help him rule the city of London because I know that Graze would always show kindness to the creatures under the command of the sadistic unicorn.

I raised my talons and a cloud of blue smoke appeared in front of me. Within the blue smoke, I could see the sleeping form of Sir Phobos slowly materialize. He was wearing the white armor that Reaper had made for him, which was good. He'd need his armor in order to intimidate the dragons in Vanhoover into doing what needed to be done.

"Sir Phobos, wake up," the unicorn opened his eyes slowly and he smiled at me. I watched as he slowly stood up and stretched his legs. It truly was incredible how he could move around so naturally while he was wearing his heavy armor. His strength was truly astonishing, and sometimes I wished that I had his physical strength. Perhaps if I had been born with his strength and beauty my mother wouldn't have tried to get rid of me.

"King Priapism, it is a pleasure to be here. Why have you summoned me?" I smiled as Sir Phobos bowed in front of me. It made me feel powerful to know that I had the respect and loyalty of such a strong unicorn. 

Unicorns were so cowardly most of the time. I remembered listening to Telia complain about how the unicorns in her town refused to even attempt to battle the invading army of zombies. I was aware of how their magic didn't affect the zombies brought to life with occult magic, but if a dragon without magical abilities could defeat them, then I didn't understand why an army of unicorns couldn't.

It seemed that the problem was that the unicorns got too dependent on using their abilities that they couldn't function if they couldn't use them. If they couldn't solve a problem by using a simple magic spell they didn't want to solve it at all.

That was why I admired Sir Phobos. He made sure that the citizens under his command never became too dependent on magic. He taught his citizens to hunt and forage for their food. He demanded that his citizens create their own technology instead of using the existing technology left behind by the humans. I wished that the dragons in my city could be more like the unicorns that Sir Phobos ruled over.

"Sir Phobos, you are my most trusted ally and my most powerful knight. I feel as though I don't tell you how much I appreciate you as often as I should," Sir Phobos nodded his head.

"King Priapism, I only live to serve you. I do not need a reassuring voice to congratulate me," I smiled at the unicorn who was still bowing in front of me. He was so submissive despite all of his strength. As far as I knew, Sir Phobos had never been as submissive to anyone else in his entire life.

"Sir Phobos, when the sun rises I want you to gather every female dragon in the city and confine them in a single building. You can choose whichever building you think would work best," Sir Phobos obediently nodded his head.

"Of course, my king. Might I ask why?" He already knew the answer, he just wanted to hear me say it out loud.

"Breeding. We are going to need a lot more dragons to repopulate the world," Sir Phobos grinned sadistically.

"You're talking about treating dragons like livestock," I nodded my head. 

"Sir Phobos, this world is full of sin. Once I have cleansed the world of sin we will need to rebuild the world. A century of hardship is a small price to pay for a perfect world," the unicorn could barely contain his excitement. The thought of thousands of creatures suffering for a full century must have felt like a dream come true for his darker side.

"King Priapism, can I brand them?" I shook my head and walked up to the bowing unicorn. I softly stroked the only horn on his head that was a part of him and not a part of his armor.

His armor had always fascinated me because it made him look like a dragon, not like an armored unicorn. He had told me that he felt more comfortable when he was wearing armor than when he was not wearing armor, he said that the armor made him feel complete.

I paid him a visit once while he was sleeping, and I heard him whimper to himself. I had never heard him cry before. The only time that I had ever seen him sad was when Telia had left him to study magic with me and later on to move to her little town to become my representative. Sir Phobos never really moved on from Telia's departure, and he made it his top priority to make sure that I never aided her town like I aided every other town under my control.

"Sir Phobos, they deserve a small amount of dignity," the unicorn obviously felt differently, but he didn't make his objections known.

"Yes, King Priapism," Sir Phobos stopped bowing and raised his head so that he was staring directly into my eyes.

"King Priapism, who is going to breed with the females? Are we going to just let any dragon breed with them, or are we going to only allow the strongest to breed with them?" I smiled as I raised my talons. A familiar cloud of blue smoke appeared in a corner of the room.

I'd always found the sight of the blue smoke to be comforting. It served as a nice reminder of the power that I possessed. As long as I could see the blue smoke, I knew that nothing could hurt me.

"Telia?” Sir Phobos stared angrily at the blue smoke. “What the fuck is my sister doing kissing a dragon?" That wasn't what I was expecting to hear. I turned my head to see that Oryps, my beautiful pet, was kissing Telia, but that wasn't what intrigued me.

"That child on the bed looks a little bit familiar," I remarked mostly to myself. I could tell that Sir Phobos was thinking the same thing that I was.

"How could she? How could she fucking breed with a dragon and produce that abomination!" His tail ignited, and I mentally prepared myself to extinguish the flame if he lost control of his power.

"Sir Phobos, I think that the child looks beautiful," I walked up to the blue smoke and lightly touched the image of the sleeping child. It truly did look gorgeous. The spawn of a perfect unicorn and a perfect dragon, with the potential to have all of their strengths and none of their weaknesses.

_ Why would Telia hide such a beautiful creature from both me and her brother? _

"I want that child," I turned to face the armored unicorn. "Will you go get it for me?"

Sir Phobos turned his gaze away from the blue smoke and glared at me. There was so much hatred in his eyes and I knew that none of it was directed at me. He hated his sister for not telling him about the dragon or the child, and he hated the child for existing.

"Do you want it dead or alive?" He raised his hoof to silence me before I could answer him.

"King Priapism, I'm kidding. I know that you want that thing alive," even when he was angry the unicorn's loyalty towards me was absolute. As evil and sadistic as he may have been, there was no other living creature in the entire world who I would rather have beside me as a servant.

"Sir Phobos, have you ever been in love," the unicorn turned his head to face me. He seemed to be as shocked as I was that I asked him such a strange question.

"King Priapism, love is a weakness that I cannot allow myself to have," the fire on his tail diminished a little bit and his muscles seemed to relax slightly.

"But, I can't lie to you. Part of me still loves my sister, and many years ago when I was just another soldier on the battlefield I did love someone special," that was the first time that I had ever seen a smile on the unicorn's face that didn't disturb me.

It was so pure and so nice. The kindness in his eyes as he remembered his mysterious special someone was such a rare and precious thing that I felt blessed to be able to witness it. I made sure to savor every millisecond of the moment, because I doubted that I would ever see that kindness in his eyes ever again.

"What happened to her?" The kindness left his eyes immediately. All that I could see was the darkness that I had always seen in his eyes.

"It wasn't a girl, and it wasn't a unicorn. It was a dragon hermaphrodite," I smiled as I raised my talons. The blue smoke glowed brightly, which meant that Sir Phobos was free to use the smoke to teleport to the room to seize the child.

"You will have to tell me about it when you return," Sir Phobos nodded his head.

"Of course, my king. I shall never deny you any information you request."

\---

Before King Priapism took control of the city the unicorns in London would search for other colonies of unicorns. Once we had found a colony, we would slaughter the men, then we would take the women and children back to our colony. We would teach the children our ways and breed with the females, then we would send them back where we found them to run their colony correctly.

Normally, those missions were very simple and were completed efficiently. Normally things didn't go horribly wrong.

200 unicorns were defeated so easily by the unicorns in the city. They used magic, they used archery and they used traps. I was the only unicorn left after our initial assault failed horribly.

I hid in a building like a scared child and they sent a dragon inside to kill me. Dragons and unicorns working together was a rare thing, dragons who lived with unicorns were almost unheard of. If the dragon had lived with those unicorns he must have been taken away from his colony when he was just an egg.

I surprised the dragon and I gouged out his eyes. While he struggled to find me, I sliced his throat with my horn and I watched him bleed to death on the floor. As he died, I thought to myself about how he might have lived if he had been a female, if he had been a virgin, and if he had breasts. Unicorns like me always felt a powerful, nearly irresistible, urge to suck on the fully formed breasts of virgin women. For some reason, that also applied to dragon breasts. It was a good thing that virgin dragons with fully developed breasts were so rare.

Unicorns soldiers were taught that using armor was an act of cowardice, so I was hesitant about creating makeshift armor using the bones and scales of the dragon. But, I knew that I wouldn't be able to avenge my fallen soldiers if I didn't have some protection.

I also needed weapons, so I carved the bones in his arms into blades and tied them onto my arms with a combination of the dragon's sinew and his organs.

There were only about 50 unicorns in the city that could fight, and I managed to kill all of them. But, I didn't stop there. My bloodlust needed to be satiated and my fallen soldiers needed to be avenged. I didn't leave the city until every single unicorn had been slaughtered. Women, children, men, it didn't matter to me.

I wished that there had been more unicorns in the city to slaughter. I must have killed hundreds of unicorns and their screams filled me with so much joy. I loved it when the children begged for their lives and the mothers pleaded with me to kill them instead of their children.

When they were all dead, I walked out of the city and into a nearby forest. I set up camp with a makeshift shelter made from tree branches and I fell asleep beside a warm fire.

When I woke up I saw that a young dragon with light-brown scales and yellow wings had curled up beside me. It had obviously been attracted by the heat of the fire, and when the fire had burnt out it curled up against me, the other source of heat. I didn't know much about dragons, but I knew that they hated to be cold.

"Mroa mroa," the dragon murmured sleepily. It snuggled up against my body, and I considered killing it like I had killed all of the unicorns in the city.

I allowed it to sleep beside me. It wasn't threatening me, and it didn't seem strong enough or smart enough to hurt me.

I waited until it woke up, which was a big mistake. The creature sleepily opened its eyes, then it yawned and stretched in an adorable way. My father used to tell me that adorable creatures were useful for food and companionship, but that I should always kill adorable things before I became too attached to them.

I was vulnerable to the cute dragon because I had just watched my entire army of unicorns die in front of my eyes. I didn't feel affection for any of them, but I felt like I had failed all of them. I felt as though I was stronger, if I was smarter and if I had been better prepared I could have saved all of them.

I felt like a failure because all of the soldiers that I had fought with had been killed. A part of me thought that I needed to make sure that the weak creature that seemed to trust me survived. If I could protect the pathetic beast, I could prove to myself that I wasn't completely useless

"Mroa mroa, hungry," the creature's stomach growled. I wasn't sure what I could feed to the dragon. The only thing that I knew about dragons was that they were opportunistic omnivores that preferred meat but would eat vegetables when no meat was available.

Luckily for the hungry dragon, I had carried some unicorn flesh from the city. I was planning on eating it when I woke up to give me strength for the walk home. I supposed it wouldn't have been the worst idea in the world to share some meat with the little dragon.

"If you get a taste for this stuff and try to eat me, it won't end well for you," I tore off a leg from the dead unicorn and I gave it to the little dragon. The dragon looked at the leg for a moment, then it bit into the flesh. I wasn't surprised to see that the beast enjoyed the taste of unicorn meat.

We sat together and ate our fill of unicorn flesh. When we were finished eating and our bellies were full, we walked out of the forest together.

"Mroa mroa," the beast started to fall behind and I could see its eyelids drooping. I sighed and lowered my body so that the beast could climb onto my back. The beast stared at me for a moment before it happily crawled on top of me. It didn't take long for the creature to fall asleep on my back once it was comfortable.

"You're just a little snuggle bug, aren't you?" The creature sleepily murmured something unintelligible.

I walked in silence for a few hours with the weight of the creature on my back, and eventually I stepped out of the forest into a long stretch of grassland. I knew that if I kept walking I would soon reach the fleet of boats that me and the rest of the soldiers had arrived on. Once I returned to the boats and told the captain of the fleet what had happened, we would set sail back to London.

The creature started to stir on my back and I knew that when it woke up it would probably want something to eat. Luckily for both of us, I saw a small pond with some berry bushes close by.

I walked to the pond and laid down on the grass just as my new friend woke up. The creature rolled off of my back and landed on the soft ground. The way that its eyes lit up when it saw the berry bushes warmed my cold heart.

"Mroa food mroa!" The creature shouted excitedly as it ran to the berry bushes as quickly as possible. I could feel my eyelids begin to droop, and I wondered if the creature would be around when I woke up.

\---

"Hey! Stop kissing my sister you bastard!" No one ever attacked when they heard me yelling, and my mind worked much faster when I was in battle mode. In the time it took to yell at the purple-scaled dragon I was able to scan the room for potential threats.

The child sleeping on the bed wouldn't cause any problems. The only creatures that I had to worry about were the strange black-furred creature in the corner of the room, my sister, the purple dragon and possibly the ghost trying to hide in the floor.

I could see the tail of the ghost, but I doubted that the other creatures had noticed the spectre. The main reason why I had survived so many battles was because I made sure to always be aware of any potential threats.

"Sir Phobos, I have long since dreaded this day. Why did you disturb us in an uncouth way?" I had forgotten how much I missed hearing my sister's voice.

I didn't know why I took her into my home and took care of her after I killed my father. When I saw her lying on the floor, cold and helpless, I felt like something within myself refused to allow me to kill her. I felt empathy towards her because a part of me remembered when I was just as helpless.

She didn't like me at first, but she eventually grew to trust me and love me like a sister should love her brother. Against my better judgement, I grew to love her. She broke down every single wall that I had built to prevent myself from caring about anyone and then she left me.

Why did she leave me? I gave her everything she ever needed, everything she ever wanted, and I would have given her even more. Was I not good enough for her?

No, I wasn't good enough for her, I was nothing compared to King Priapism and I understood why she chose to study with him. But, she didn't need to leave me to study with him, we could have stayed together. It hurt me that she didn’t understand why I felt the way that I did.

"Sister, why did you hide my nephew from me?" When I asked the question I noticed that the purple-scaled dragon was scanning my body, searching for a weakness. He was a warrior, just like me. He was strong, he was smart and judging by his wounds, he had probably been in a number of battles. Telia chose a good mate and when her child matured he would likely be a great warrior as well.

I could make him into a great warrior and King Priapism could train him just like he trained Telia. When I retired, the child would be able to take my place as King Priapism's trusted enforcer while I lived the rest of my life comfortably as his advisor.

The black-furred beast’s muscles were tense, but her battle stance was pathetic. She had the strength to battle me, but she had no idea how to use her strength against a trained warrior.

The ghost was shivering in fear. She would not be a threat to me in any way and it would have been a waste of time to focus any of my attention on her.

"I don't need to explain myself, brother. I was pregnant and now I'm a mother," the red began to overtake her eyes. She was getting angry and I couldn't have her getting angry.

"I understand, sister. You're either ashamed of me, or afraid of me. I understand, but that doesn't mean that I'm not hurt," I loaded a blue smoke bullet as I talked to her. My armor truly was a wonderful creation, it was connected to my mind just as my own arms and legs were. I could control the claws and the wings easily with only my thoughts.

The bullet was loaded and I just needed to wait until the red disappeared from Telia's eyes so that I could attack. It didn't matter how strong she was, all that mattered in a magic duel was who attacked first, because there was rarely ever a second attack.

One shot, that was all that I needed, then I could deal with the purple-scaled dragon. It would be nice to finally fight an opponent who might be able to offer me an actual challenge. It had been so long since I had to struggle during a battle and my armor only made the problem worse because it made me stronger. King Priapism was the only creature that I had ever encountered that I could never defeat.

"No friend, family?" The idiotic black-furred creature spoke. The fur of the beast was covered with small amounts of mud, urine, feces and grass. I assumed that she would normally be spending a night like that in the forest where she probably lived, not in the warm candlelit room where my nephew slept.

She was clearly traumatized about some terrible event and if she would latch onto my sister she was probably desperate for friends. She was likely traumatized when she saw her family and friends die in front of her, which left her with no one. Seeing your family die was, sadly, not a rare thing, and seeing your friends die was even more common. She probably became desperate for companionship and she somehow met my sister after the traumatic event.

"What are you waiting for?" The dragon spoke. Although there was a clear masculine huskiness to his voice, he sounded oddly feminine. Graze once told me that most dragons were homosexual, which must have made it difficult for dragons to reproduce, so perhaps the dragon was gay. Perhaps that was the reason why unicorns were far more plentiful, we had a lot more sex with a lot more females.

"Telia, why were you so desperate for a child that you allowed a faggot dragon to fuck you?" For just a second, she looked away from me and glanced at the purple-scaled dragon. That single second was all that I needed.

I quickly lifted my metal claw and fired a magic bullet. The bullet pierced her shoulder, which didn't kill her, but it sent her into shock. I could have easily fired bullets at all of the creatures in the room and have walked out with the child, but that would have been boring. I was a soldier and I lived for the thrill of battle. Dominating strong foes effortlessly made me feel powerful.

"Hurt friend!" The black-furred creature leapt at me from the side and I turned my body slightly to avoid her attack. She crashed against the wall like the idiot she was. The creature groaned in pain after the impact, which was understandable. She had probably never experienced that kind of pain in her life.

I foolishly left myself open to attack and the dragon moved far quicker than I thought he would. He quickly moved towards me and latched on to my back. His body was too strong to crush with my metal wings and I felt his talons dig into the softer parts of my armor. His jaw was positioned directly over the small amount of exposed flesh between my plate armor and my helmet.

This dragon was smart and strong, but if he wanted me dead he would have simply bit down and killed me. All that I needed to do to turn the battle around was to find a weakness in the dragon just like he had found a weakness in my armor. Luckily for me, it seemed as though I might have all the time in the world to do so.

"Talk, now," the fool was letting his curiosity dictate his actions. Perhaps that could be the weakness that I could exploit.

"Do you want me to apologize to you, faggot?" I turned my head to look him in the eye. "Or do you want to hear me moan as you sodomize me, you little-" I paused and studied his eyes. For less than a second, I felt his limbs loosen their grip on me and I saw his eyes twitch. Being a soldier, I was very familiar with the eye twitch. I had seen so many different eye twitches and face twitches over the years.

\---

Many years ago I had a soldier who fought beside me named Skycloud. The soldier was a black-coat who was only in the army as a way of appeasing the black-coats. The black-coats were angry that there weren't enough black-coats in the army and they demanded that we accept at least twenty black-coats into the military.

Skycloud was a smart young black-coat who shouldn't have enlisted in the army. He didn't want to fight or kill any unicorns, he just wanted to heal the wounded soldiers and plan battle strategies with me.

When I met him for the first time he asked for my autograph and he claimed that he idolized me. I was 22 at the time and I had been in battles since I was 15. I was already a celebrity when I was 16 after word spread that I had defeated an entire opposing army by myself after my army had been decimated. By the time I was 18 I was the most feared and respected soldier in the entire colony and every unicorn knew that eventually I would be in-charge of the entire military.

"Could there ever be a Mr. Phobos?" I slapped the unicorn hard across his face and I watched him stare at me with hurt in his eyes. He looked like I had just murdered his favourite puppy.

"I'm not a faggot, and even if I was I would never consider marrying a black-coat," I spat at the pathetic unicorn as he wept on the floor. "Now, get up you disgusting piece of worm shit. We're going to make sure that most of our soldiers make it home safely and all of the enemy soldiers rot on top of the blood-soaked ground."

"B-b-but, Sir Phobos. Th-there a-are rumors that you, erm, you-" I slammed his head down onto the floor. Yes, I was completely aware that some of the crew aboard Captain Lavender's ship had seen me in my room fellating the hermaphrodite dragon that I had found, as well as being fellated by it. I was also aware that they had spread rumors around the city about my sexuality, claiming that I was either straight, bi-sexual or homosexual.

The truth was that I didn't believe in the idea of sexuality. To me, sex was just one creature stimulating the genitals of another creature and the stimulation felt just as good if a tree was rubbing against my penis or a beautiful female unicorn was rubbing it. Sex was boring to me and love was a weakness that I could not allow myself to have.

"Rumors of what exactly? Rumors that I sucked the shaft and licked the vagina of a hermaphrodite when I was a young soldier controlled by my hormones? Those rumors mean nothing," I stepped away from the black-coat. I feared that if I hurt him anymore I might kill him or give him serious brain damage. 

"If they did mean something. If I did fall in love with a brain-damaged hermaphrodite who died tragically, do you really think that it would be a good idea to tear open my old wounds?" I snarled at the pathetic unicorn.

The weeping unicorn stood up from the floor and he spent the rest of the day helping me plan the attack on whatever city it was that our army had been told to attack. When we were finished, he left the room.

He fought beside me alongside the first wave of soldiers we sent into the city, but it was clear that he didn't belong on a battlefield. He whimpered in fear and tried to hide behind me whenever he saw an enemy approach him. He was the only soldier that I had ever seen who didn't seem to have any survival instincts whatsoever.

Then, he started to see soldiers dying in front of him from both sides of the battle. There were always casualties in war because even the best trained soldier could be killed, and even the best battle plans were created knowing that some unicorns would die.

Skycloud was aware that he would see unicorns die, but nothing could prepare him for the horror of seeing a mutilated body, or seeing life slowly leave the eyes of a dying unicorn.

When the battle was finished, he started talking to demons that only he could hear. When the demons became a bit too persistent he would shout: "Suck a cheetah's dick and leave me alone!"

I arranged to share a room with him aboard the ship which would take us back home. I confronted him about the demons as he wrapped himself in a bright blue blanket with an image of a rainbow.

"We need to talk," Skycloud hid his head under his blanket. I knew that he respected me, but he was also terrified of me. He knew that I could severely hurt him, or worse, if he told me something that I didn't want to hear.

"I didn't think that you cared," I scoffed. No, I didn't care about his well-being, but I couldn't have a schizophrenic soldier shouting swears at his demons during a time of war.

"Get out of here you donkey-cock-sucking piece of fucking shit," the poor black-coat whispered quietly to himself, hoping that I wouldn't hear him.

"I know what you're going through and I want to give you some advice. Not because I care about you, but because I care about the well-being of my army," he didn't notice me as I walked up to him. I pulled the blanket down and the pathetic black-coat fell onto the floor.

"I can't have you in my army anymore, and I know that you can't just go back to your pathetic life in London. You're sick and you need help."

"You made me sick!" Skycloud shrieked. The black-coat stood up from the floor and glared at me.

"These fucking demons only appeared after you hit me until I was a fucking bloody mess on the fucking floor! You created these father-fucking demons!" I slapped him and he fell onto the floor.

"I don't want to fucking be here anymore! I can handle the war, but I can't handle you!"

"You ungrateful fucking son of a black-coat! I saved your life on the battlefield. If it wasn't for me, you'd be dead," the black-coat continued to glare at me from where he was lying on the floor. There was a deep cut on his forehead and I could see some blood dripping onto his eyes, but he didn't seem to care.

"I want to fucking die! Do you think that I want to live the rest of my life talking to demons?" The black-coat didn't flinch when I raised my hoof with the intention to slap him again.

"Go ahead! Kill me, hurt me, maybe if you hit me hard enough I'll start hearing another fucking demon!" The optimistic black-coat who naively asked me if I would ever consider marrying him was completely gone. In his place was a broken and bitter mentally-unstable black-coat who was only moments away from a complete mental breakdown.

"You're not special just because you had one bad day and it broke you. Everyone in this army had a bad day, everyone in this whole fucking world has had a bad day," the black-coat continued to glare at me. His eye was twitching, and his mind was erratic. The demons were probably shrieking at him.

"What were you like before your bad day?" I slapped the unicorn and he fell onto the floor yet again.

I was never good at exorcising demons.

\---

"What are the voices saying, faggot? Are they telling you to kill me? Are you gonna listen to them?" I needed him to flinch. I needed him to react in some way to give me an opening to break free from his hold.

"Talk, now. Tell me about your bad day," the dragon spoke to me in a calm voice after I taunted him, which surprised me. Very few things could surprise me, and I guessed that I should have been impressed that the father of my nephew had found a way to surprise me, but I was just annoyed.

"You're just trying to psyche me out. It won't work," I refused to fall for any of his dirty tricks. I needed to be completely focused to break out of his hold.

"If I wanted to kill you, then you would be dead. I can ssee that there'ss ssome light in you. What happened to you that made you hide your light?" My eyes narrowed. The only part of me that could be considered to be good was the part of me that loved my sister. But, that part of me was so insignificant that it might as well have not existed.

"Why do you care? Do you want to fix me?" The black-furred creature was stirring on the floor. Within a minute or two she would be ready to attack me. Telia would probably recover fairly soon, which wasn't good for me since she'd probably be angry at me for shooting her.

"I believe in a world where the sstrong help the weak to become sstrong. I alsso believe that any threatss to the weak sshould be removed," did the dragon truly think that I was weak?

"I'm not weak," I coldly said to the dragon. The black-furred creature stood up and my sister was starting to stir. The battle was over, and the only option available to me was to let myself be killed or call out to King Priapism for help.

But, I couldn't call for help, because that would be a sign of weakness, and I was not weak. I would rather let the dragon murder me than admit to being weak.

"When you entered the room, I ssaw the love that you feel for your ssisster radiating through your eyess. If there wassn't ssome light within your ssoul, none of uss would be alive right now," I swore under my breath. The faggot was right, I should have just killed all of them or just quickly grabbed the child and left.

I wanted to say something to my sister, and that weakness was why I failed the simple mission. If I wasn't so weak, then I would have been at King Priapism's side holding my nephew.

"Fine, you got me. I'm weak and you're stronger than me. You exploited my weakness and you won the fight. Just, finish the battle already. Kill me," the black-furred creature was standing in front of me with a curious expression on her face. She wasn't afraid of me, she didn't hate me for hurting her friend or her. It almost looked like she pitied me.

"Want be friend?" No, I did not want to be a friend to a disgusting black beast who couldn't even speak my language correctly. The bitch could rot in the ground just like Skycloud.

"Get away from me," I felt so small and powerless. I just wanted to leave or die.

The creature didn't seem to understand a word that I said, which was completely expected. The stupid bitch embraced me, even though I couldn't feel her touch because I was wearing my armor.

"It okay, friend. Everyone hurts sometimes," no. That stupid bitch didn't understand me. She didn't understand the agony that I'd gone through, she didn't know about the thousands of creatures that I had murdered. If those creatures thought that I could be redeemed, they were fools.

"I'm not weak! I don't need a fucking hand to hold or a shoulder to cry on!" The black-furred creature's hug distracted the dragon momentarily, which provided me with the opportunity to use my metal claw to quickly dig into the wrist of the dragon. I pushed the female creature away from me and with a fast motion I tore off the talons of the purple-scaled dragon.

I quickly grabbed the sleeping child, and I ran into the blue portal before any of the creatures recovered. That wasn't my proudest moment. That was the first time that I had ever ran away from a fight since I had received my armor. Maybe I was becoming weaker as I got older.

King Priapism was staring at me with a sympathetic expression on his face. His one working eye appeared to be scanning my body, looking for some kind of damage. Luckily for me, the only damage that was on my body were a couple of scratches from the dragon's talons. I hurt him a lot more than he hurt me.

"Is there anything that you want to talk about?" I shook my head. I knew that King Priapism would ask me that question as soon as I entered the portal.

"Here's the kid you wanted," I gently placed the sleeping child on the floor in front of my king. "I'm going to take a nap,” I started to walk away from the dragon, but I was stopped by a cloud of blue smoke that blocked my path.

"Sir Phobos, you're not going to run away from this. We need to talk about whatever it was that happened there," we definitely did not need to talk about what happened in that stupid room. I was hugged by a dragon and I felt weak because I let my guard down for just a moment during the hug. I felt weak and stupid.

But, after I ripped off the talons of the dragon and escaped his grasp, I no longer felt weak, but I still felt stupid.

"War is simple, my king. When I'm fighting in a war, all of the bullshit disappears and the only thing that matters is surviving and winning the fight. I don't have to deal with hugs during a war," I tried to explain myself to my king, but I was not sure if I could make him understand why a simple hug had such an effect on me.

"Sir Phobos, you didn't need to be hugged by my beautiful pets. Why didn't you shoot all of them instead of just Telia? Why didn't you just take the child and leave?" I knew that the question would be asked because it was a question that I had asked myself. I didn’t know how to answer the question.

"Love and stupidity, my king," I explained to him. "Part of me still loves my sister, and I wanted to talk to her. The other part of me stupidly underestimated the dragon," I growled. "Those parts of me are weaknesses that I must destroy."

King Priapism said nothing. He started stroking his massive horn with his talons like he always did when he was deep in thought. His eyes drifted between me, the portal and the child. 

"Sir Phobos, is it possible that you could become stronger if you had someone to fight for," I stiffened. That wasn't something that I had ever needed to think about because up until then I had always been strong enough to defeat any threat.

"My king, I fight for you," King Priapism shook his head and continued to gently stroke his horn.

"Sir Phobos, I believe that you were strongest when you knew that you had to make it home to take care of your sister," King Priapism raised a talon when he saw that I was about to open my mouth to correct him.

"Think about what I'm saying, Sir Phobos. If you allow yourself to open your heart again and love someone, you could become much more powerful than you are now," for the first time in my life I seriously considered striking the deformed dragon magic-user. 

"Forgive me, my king. But I don't think that I'll magically become stronger simply because I try to love someone," King Priapism nodded his head slowly and sarcastically, as though he was mocking me.

"Sir Phobos, my strength comes from the love that I feel for my friends, my son and my pets. That dragon who defeated you gains his strength from the love he feels for his friends and family. Are you suggesting that me and him are weaker than you?" I shook my head and I growled. He had a point, but I still wasn't sure if I fully agreed with him.

"My king, both of you would still be strong even if you had no one to love," the light in King Priapism's eyes disappeared. He looked as though his soul had left his body to be as far away from me as possible. Did my statement really offend him that much?

"No," he said simply. "No," he said the same word a second time, as if he wanted to remove any doubt that I might have. I knew how strong he was and I was sure that love had nothing to do with his strength. Love was nothing but an abstract concept, it didn't exist and it couldn't make a dragon or a unicorn stronger.

But, my king had never been wrong before and that gay dragon was very strong. Maybe it wouldn't be a bad idea to try to love someone again.

"My king, I trust you. But, surely you must realize how difficult it would be for me to find someone who could love me," King Priapism smiled at me. He reached out and placed his talons on my horn, then he started to gently stroke it as though I was his pet. No one other than my king and my sister had been allowed to get anywhere near my horn since I became Sir Phobos. When I was just Artemis, the scared young unicorn, I trusted so many unicorns and I allowed them to stroke my horn and mane whenever they wanted. I had matured a lot since the days when I was a foolish child.

"Sir Phobos, in this city you have no past. Very few creatures know who you are here. If you want to find someone to love, you can look around this city," my gaze wandered to the sleeping unicorn-dragon hybrid that King Priapism had picked up from the floor. He was holding it in his arms as though it was something precious instead of an abomination.

"Is that what you desire, my king? Do you want me to mate with a female dragon?" King Priapism smiled a little bit as he gently stroked the sleeping child.

"I wouldn't be opposed to the idea of more of these little things in the world."

\---

"Sir Phobos," I heard a knock on the door to my room, but I didn't acknowledge it. I had heard the exact same knock once every week for the previous 6 months. He would always knock at that time, a few minutes after I had been washed by my servants and one hour before I would go to sleep. I would always spend that time exercising or training. Even in London I knew that I couldn't let my guard down and I could never allow myself to grow fat and weak.

Skycloud entered my room without waiting for my response. His eyes were twitching and I could tell that he was thinking about the war, or me, or the racist white-coats, or the condescending black-coats. Something was troubling him and he came to talk to me, just like he always did.

"Did you watch the hoofball game?" He always asked the same question because he knew that when I was in the city I would never willingly miss a game of hoofball. One of my favorite things to do on a hot summer day was to visit the stadium and watch two teams play a good game of hoofball.

Unfortunately, that week the game that I watched wasn't a very good game. In the first quarter one of the teams gained a 30-point lead which the other team never really caught up to. I never got the impression that the other team would win the game and it was boring to watch.

"Yeah I did," I said to the unicorn. "It wasn't very good."

Skycloud nodded his head in agreement. I didn't like him very much, but I had gained some respect and affection for him. I wouldn't have considered him to be a friend, but I wasn't as hostile towards him as I had been when we first met.

"I watched it too, and I agree," the unicorn said to me, and I nodded my head in agreement. He wanted to ask me the same questions that he always asked, he just didn't want to ask them immediately. He wanted to have a light-hearted conversation with me before he asked the questions that I hated answering.

"Hey, umm, Sir Phobos. Are the rumors true? Do you have a sister?" On a normal day I would have told him to leave or I would have allowed him to stay and simply ignored his question. But I was in a pretty good mood, so I decided to answer his question.

"Yes, I do have a sister," I raised my hoof to silence him when I saw that he was about to ask the second question that he always asked. "Yes, she is also a black-coat."

The stunned look on his face was worth the wait. He was fully aware that if almost every soldier in my army was talking about my sister then she was probably real, but I think that he didn't want to believe that I could ever be related to a black-coat. The only reason why I decided to raise her was because she was the only blood-relative that I had left. I couldn't kill her and I couldn't leave her to die.

"Sir Phobos, I need to know. Do you love her?" I knew that eventually someone would ask that question, I just didn't think that Skycloud would be the first one. I thought that King Priapism or Graze or Telia herself would ask it before Skycloud did.

"She's my sister," I honestly wasn't sure if I truly loved her or not. She was my sister, so I obviously felt some kind of attachment to her, but I wasn't sure if I truly had any affection or genuine love for her. Skycloud chuckled darkly to himself.

"I never thought that you would ever love a black-coat," there was a bit of bitterness to his voice. After I had beaten him he fell out of love with me, but at some point during his military career he fell in love with me again. When King Priapism arrived and we didn't need to fight as many battles, the affection he felt towards me grew. He was in love with me once again, but he knew that he would never be with me the way that he wanted. I could never love him the way that he wanted to be loved.

"Things change, Skycloud," the black-coat scoffed in exactly the way that I thought that he would. In our world, things didn't change. We would go to war, we would fight, some of us would die, then we would return home. Until King Priapism showed up, things didn't change.

"Sir Phobos, with all due respect, some things don't change. There are constants and there are variables," I always hated when he mentioned things that I didn't know about. Maybe if I had received medical training to become a doctor like I originally wanted to do I would know what constants and variables were.

"Sir Phobos, you are a constant, and I think your little sister is a variable," he stepped a little bit closer towards me. It seemed like a part of him was concerned for me, but part of him was still terrified of me.

"All that I'm saying is, don't take it too hard when she grows up," the black-coat had such an adorable voice. When I first met the black-coat he was a dumb gay child who needed my guiding hoof to turn him into the brave unicorn he had become. I was glad when I watched him grow up and I would be glad when Telia grew up.

"I didn't take it hard when you grew up," the black-coat scoffed and shook his head.

"I can't tell if you're joking or if you honestly don't remember all that you did to me. You cracked open my skull three different times, three different fucking times. Normal unicorns would have left you," he paused as though he was expecting me to say something. I could see it in his eyes that he wanted me to ask him why he stayed with me for so long.

I didn't want to tell him that I would never ask the question because I was sure that the only reason why he stayed with me was because he wanted me to ask him why he continued to stay with me. If I ever asked that question, he would give me his answer and then he would leave. As much as I hated to admit it, I didn't like being abandoned. My father abandoned me, and everyone I could ever call a friend had left me except for Skycloud. I never wanted to be alone and it hurt knowing that everyone I had ever loved had chosen to abandon me.

The black-coat sighed deeply. "Sir Phobos, just think about this. If your sister is normal, she'll leave you. If she stays with you forever, then she's crazy. Just remember that," he turned his back towards me and walked away.

That was the last time that I ever saw Skycloud alive. He committed suicide while I slept in my comfy bedroom. He told his black-coat servant to tell me that he didn't want me to mourn him. So, I didn't mourn him, and I didn't attend his funeral. I tried my best to live my life as though nothing tragic had happened.

King Priapism told me that I looked depressed, but no one else would dare tell me that I looked even the slightest bit sad that the only black-coat who wasn't related to me that I cared about had committed suicide. Skycloud was a truly special unicorn that I hadn't appreciated when he was alive.

Against his last request, I visited his grave on the third anniversary of his suicide. The flower that I had placed on his resting place was the only flower that would ever be placed anywhere near his tombstone that year. That was a sad thing to think about because I remembered how the entire city seemed to mourn when the first black-coat to ever have a high rank in the military had died. Just three years later, it seemed like I was the only one who cared.

"Skycloud, I hope that you're resting in peace. I'm sorry for all of the bad shit I did to you," he words tasted bitter on my tongue. Ever since I cast aside my original name I had never apologized to anyone. It was strange that the first unicorn I would find myself apologizing to was a dead gay black-coat.

"You were the first black-coat I ever liked and you became the first black-coat I ever loved. I cared about you, and, well, I never got the chance to tell you that. Maybe if I had, you would still be alive," I shook my head and I smiled, which was probably not the best thing to do in that situation. The last thing that I wanted to do was be disrespectful to my dead friend.

"I never appreciated you, Skycloud, and I neglected you. Well, I hit you as hard as I could with my hooves and gave you brain damage, that's about as far as I could get from not appreciating you. Why did you even try to be my friend after I did that shit?" One of my hooves dug into the ground in front of his gravestone and I absentmindedly started playing with the dirt.

"Maybe that's why you killed yourself, so that you wouldn't have to answer questions like that. You were too good for a place like this and a friend like me, Skycloud," I heard the sound of grass being stepped on by hooves. Someone was in the cemetery with me, possibly watching me. I needed to finish saying what I needed to say, then I needed to leave.

"But, none of this matters, does it Skycloud? You're dead and someday I'll be dead too. Maybe someone will miss me, maybe not. I hope not," that was a lie. I knew that King Priapism would miss me, I was sure that Reaper would miss me and I hoped that Telia would visit my grave at least once.

"Sir Phobos, what are you doing here?" I turned my head slightly to look at the unicorn who was standing beside me. He was a white-coat and I recognized him as a soldier in my army. Most of my soldiers didn't fight in battles anymore, so newer and weaker soldiers would often be placed in a law enforcement role in the city. That unicorn was probably assigned to enforce the laws of the city in Leicester Square.

"I'm paying my respects to a great military mind. You should be doing the same, soldier," the unicorn's eyes drifted towards the flower I had placed on the grave. I assumed that he was like all of the unicorns in my army and that he wouldn't ask about the flower.

"If you cared about him, then why didn't you attend his funeral?" That wasn't a question I was prepared to answer and the unicorn didn't deserve to hear an explanation,

"It doesn't matter. I'm paying my respects now," I turned away from the unicorn and I walked out of the cemetery. I didn't know who that white-coat was, but I knew that he didn't deserve the opportunity to ask me any more questions, especially not about Skycloud and my relationship with him.

I had done what I came to the cemetery to do. I paid my long overdue respect to the corpse of my dead friend. But as I laid on my bed that night after a training session and a relaxing massage, my mind was troubled.

I heard a knock on my door, and I knew that the unicorn who knocked had to have been Telia. She was so young and when she knocked on the door it sounded so quiet. She didn't have a lot of physical strength, but that didn't matter because she had me to protect her and she had the ability to use magic.

"A bad dream played inside my head. Tonight, may I sleep in your bed?" Sweet Telia, my little sister, had a nightmare and needed me to comfort her. Sometimes I would think about how ironic it was that she could find my presence comforting after I murdered both of her parents. Perhaps she felt safe around me because she knew that she was the only unicorn that I cared enough about to protect.

"Come in, sister. You can sleep with me, there's plenty of room," the door never opened. A cloud of red smoke appeared beside me and in an instant Telia's small body appeared beside me on my bed. She smiled sweetly at me before she made herself comfortable and prepared to sleep.

"Brother, do you ever regret keeping me alive? It would have been easier if I had died," Telia was so smart for how young she was. I adored her, but sometimes I wished that she didn't remember the murder of her parents and I wished that she didn't ask me questions like that.

"Telia, you're my sister and I love you. If I didn't want you here, then you wouldn't be here. You know that," her muscles stiffened slightly. She always got a bit tense when I reminded her that I would have no issues with killing her if I ever stopped loving her.

"Brother, I..." She paused and shook her head, as if she was about to say something bad but she didn't want to offend me, so she wanted to completely erase the thought just to make sure that he never said whatever she wanted to say to me. I gently patted her head with my hoof and I placed a gentle kiss on her forehead.

"It's okay, Telia. I know that you will never do anything to make me stop loving you," she remained silent and she didn't say another word for the rest of the night.

\---

"Hey! Stop kissing my sister you bastard!" I heard a voice that sounded deep, old and harsh. I turned my head to see a unicorn that looked exactly like the kind of creature who would own such a voice. He was covered with armor to protect himself from the harsh world, and he seemed like he was in pain as he stepped out of the cloud of blue smoke into the room.

He looked like the old kishunimaras who were constantly in pain due to their bodies deteriorating as they got older. They desperately tried to hunt as well as the younger kishunimaras, but they couldn't. The poor unicorn was probably a great warrior when he was young, but when he got older and more fragile he needed to wear armor just to protect his more fragile bones.

"Sir Phobos, I have long since dreaded this day. Why did you disturb us in an uncouth way?" I guessed that it made sense that my friend's mate would know who the armored unicorn was. Oryps seemed to know who all of the dragons in the valley were and I knew who almost all of the kishunimaras in Funeralopolis were.

"Sister, why did you hide my nephew from me?" Those two were family? I guessed that it made sense that the unicorn would have a brother, but he seemed so much older than she was. In fact, the armored unicorn sounded like he was almost twice as old as the female unicorn who was apparently the mate of the dragon that I had befriended.

Maybe that was just a weird thing about unicorns. Maybe it wasn't unusual to wait until one child had fully matured before they created a new child.

"I don't need to explain myself, brother. I was pregnant and now I'm a mother," I saw the same red in the eyes of the unicorn that I saw when she entered the room. The armored unicorn twitched for just a brief moment before he regained his composure. He was terrified of his sister, but he didn't want anyone to realize just how scared he was.

Why was he so scared and angry? What happened between him and his sister that made him that way? Was it simply that the unicorn never bothered to tell her brother about her child? If that was the reason, then why was she so ashamed of the beautiful strong child that she had conceived with a dragon that I was lucky enough to call my friend.

"I understand, sister. You're either ashamed of me, or afraid of me. I understand, but that doesn't mean that I'm not hurt," he was stalling for time. Oryps could tell that he was planning on attacking as soon as the unicorn lost her focus. His body was poised in such a way that he was ready to react to whatever the armored unicorn decided to do.

Kishunimaras mostly just turned off the part of their brains that actually thought about stuff and just allowed their instincts to dictate their actions when they fought. Sometimes that worked, sometimes it didn't, but that approach would never work against a foe like Oryps or a foe like the armored unicorn.

"No friend, family?" I felt so stupid after I had spoken. My mother always told me that I should stay silent unless I was talking to other kishunimaras because dragons and unicorns would think that I was stupid because of the way that I talked. But, there weren't any other kishunimaras anymore except for my two friends, and I didn't want to stay silent for my whole life. 

"What are you waiting for?" Oryps growled at the armored unicorn and I silently thanked the deity that no one acknowledged my foolish comment. I didn't like when creatures thought that I was stupid. Maybe that's why I hated Oryps's female friend.

No, I hated her because she got my newfound dragon friend killed because of her stupidity and selfishness. The fact that she thought that I was nothing more than a dumb beast just made me hate her a bit more.

"Telia, why were you so desperate for a child that you allowed a faggot dragon to fuck you?" The metal unicorn quickly lifted his leg and before I had a chance to react, a small glowy blue thing flew out of his metal-covered hoof and penetrated the female unicorn. 

"Hurt friend!" I pounced at the unicorn who hurt my friend with the intention of hurting him, but he effortlessly dodged my attack and I ended up tackling the hard wall. I could feel my head throbbing and I remained still for a moment. My head felt woozy and I was afraid that if I stood up I would immediately fall down again.

"Talk, now," I heard the sound of my friend's voice from behind me. I couldn't tell what was happening, and I didn't want to turn around to find out. My head hurt so much.

"Do you want me to apologize to you, faggot," I turned around quickly and immediately regretted it when I felt my neck hurt. The mean unicorn had insulted my friend and I didn't like it when anyone insulted my friends.

But, I shouldn't have been worried. My friend was strong and when I turned around I saw that my friend was holding the unicorn in a way that the unicorn couldn't escape. My friend didn't need to fight the unicorn because the unicorn couldn't fight him anymore. However, the unicorn was struggling to free himself, and that was worrying.

"Or do you want to hear me moan as you sodomize me, you little-" The unicorn paused as though he had realized something important before he could finish his sentence. I saw a smile form on his face that made me feel extremely uncomfortable.

"What are the voices saying, faggot? Are they telling you to kill me? Are you gonna listen to them?" My friend didn't seem to be bothered at all by what the unicorn was saying to him. He was a better creature than me because if a metal unicorn had called me mean names I wouldn't hesitate to attack them.

"Talk, now. Tell me about your bad day," bad days were something that I knew all about. In Funeralopolis, there weren't many good days for kishunimaras. Night Star took care of us, but he could be very cruel sometimes. The dragons that hunted us for fun also caused me to have some very bad days when my friends were killed. Sometimes a dragon would try to attack me, but I would escape from them and hide somewhere where they couldn't find me.

I was glad that Oryps wasn't like those mean dragons. He would never hurt a kishunimara unless it tried to hurt him and he would always be around to take care of me.

"You're just trying to psyche me out. It won't work," the unicorn was lying. My friend was psyching him out and the unicorn was having a hard time focusing on the situation. Oryps was in complete control and the unicorn knew that, but he refused to admit defeat. I admired him for his stubbornness. 

"If I wanted to kill you, then you would be dead. I can ssee that there'ss ssome light in you. What happened to you that made you hide your light?" There was no light that I could see within the metal unicorn. Perhaps I had been in the dark for so long that I could not recognize light when I saw it like my friend could.

"Why do you care? Do you want to fix me?" The metal unicorn seemed so confused, as though he couldn't understand why anyone would want to help someone like him. If my friend wanted to help him, then I wanted to try to help him too.

I tried to stand up, but my body still hurt too much and I needed some time to recover.

"I believe in a world where the sstrong help the weak to become sstrong. I also believe that any threatss to the weak sshould be removed," I stood up even though my body was still aching. My neck felt so stiff, as though there was a stone or something within my flesh.

"I'm not weak," the unicorn was right, he wasn't weak, but he was weaker than my friend.

"When you entered the room, I ssaw the love that you feel for your ssisster radiating through your eyess. If there wassn't ssome light within your ssoul, none of uss would be alive right now," I started walking towards the metal unicorn. I wanted to look into his eyes and see if I could see some of the light that my friend claimed to have seen.

"Fine, you got me. I'm weak and you're stronger than me. You exploited my weakness and you won the fight. Just, finish the battle already. Kill me," I looked into the eyes of the metal unicorn. Even though I could see a lot of darkness within him, I could also see a tiny sliver of bright light.

He wasn't a truly evil unicorn because he had a little glimmer of goodness within him. Maybe he was like me and had lived so long in the darkness that he no longer believed that there was any light within him. Perhaps he needed a friend like I needed a friend during my darkest moment. 

"Want be friend?" The unicorn sneered at me, which was exactly what I expected him to do. Maybe he needed a hug to convince him that I could be the friend that he needed. Maybe if I hugged him hard enough with enough love I could convince him to realize how much light existed inside of him

"Get away from me," the unicorn didn't want to be hugged, but that was alright. Someday he would learn to enjoy the hugs of friends who loved him.

"It okay, friend. Everyone hurts sometimes," I hugged him as tightly as I could as Oryps continued to hold him tightly to prevent him from escaping. It felt as though we were having a nice group hug together. He squirmed within my embrace and I should have been worried about such a dangerous creature breaking free from the hug, but I wasn't.

"I'm not weak! I don't need a fucking hoof to hold or a shoulder to cry on!" The unicorn yelled as he broke free from my friend's grip and pushed me away. I closed my eyes when my head hit the floor and when I opened them I was shocked to see that the unicorn had left.

It took me a few seconds to realize that in the brief moment that I had closed my eyes, the unicorn had managed to steal my friend's sleeping son from his bed. It took me another moment to see the stump on the dragon’s body oozing blood onto the floor.

My friend only allowed the shock and disgust on his face to be displayed for a single moment before he brought the bloody stump to his face. He opened his mouth, he inhaled deeply and then he immediately exhaled fire onto the bloody stump where his talons used to be.

He howled in pain as he collapsed onto the floor.

\---

"Don't touch," my hiss sounded like a whimper as I pushed Night Star's tail away from me. I didn't know what part of my body he wanted to touch and I didn't care. I wasn't going to let him touch me again if I could stop him.

"Sweetheart, I just wanted to make you feel special," his words made my heart feel like a dragon had pierced it with its sharp teeth and talons. When I was younger, my mother had called me her "sweetheart," and she always said that she wanted to make me feel special. When she had tried to make me feel good about myself, it felt nice.

When Night Star tried to make me feel special, it didn't feel nice at all. I wished that my mother was with me so that I wouldn't have been alone with Night Star.

\---

"Are you alright?" The glare from Oryps told the ghost dragon everything that she wanted to know and she cowered in fear as though she momentarily forgot that she was a ghost who couldn't be hurt by him.

"My sson iss gone and my talonss are missssing, I'm definitely not alright," he winced when he glanced at the end of his arm where his talons once were.

"But, I'm going to make thingss right. I'm going to get Thorn back, reunite you with Xnoy and free uss from thesse collarss. I losst my focuss and I paid the price. I won't losse my focuss again," he sounded so determined to help us all. He was so sure that he could save his son, get the collar off of my neck and reunite the ghost with her mate even after he had been dismembered just a few moments ago.

I admired him so much and I wondered what would have happened if we had a kishunimara who was anything like him when the small dragon killed Night Star. Maybe that kishunimara could have ended the slaughter, or protected Night Star, or maybe he could have made sure that more than three kishunimaras survived.

"Oryps, help me, please I beg. My wound is infected, I can't move my leg," Oryps picked up the female unicorn and held her in his arms before she had finished speaking. The unicorn smiled as she nuzzled against his body as he carried her out of the room.

"Thank you, my husband, for being so strong. I neglected you, and now I understand I was wrong," I followed the two of them out of the house like a loyal pet.

\---

Like an everflowing stream, the tears fell from my eyes as I watched my beloved Telia being carried from her home by the brutish purple-scaled dragon. She stared at him like I wished that she would stare at me and they were followed by the furry pet that I always wanted to have.

It wasn't fair! I had sewn a dress for Telia using nothing more than my sweat, my tears, my love and the magic that I had learned from Telia in her classes. What did that dragon ever do for her except save her life a few times from Tanin'iver?

Well, maybe it was fair that Telia ended up with Oryps, but I still wished that she ended up with me. I cared about her, I listened to her, I studied her. There wasn't anything about her that I didn't already know.

"...Oryps, I want to see our daughter," I froze when I heard those words. She had a daughter and I didn't know about her. What kind of wannabe lover did that make me? A terrible lover, that's what it made me. If I had known about her daughter, maybe we could have bonded and I could have formed a loving relationship with Telia through her.

I couldn't do that with her son because he was a brute who had eaten a number of unicorns in our village, some of whom I had called my friends. But a sweet little girl was different.

Or was she? Why would Telia raise a brutal creature like Thorn in her home and hide her beautiful daughter from the world? Maybe her daughter was so sweet and pure that she didn't want her to be in the same house as Thorn? That might have been the answer.

"My fucking wings, my fucking talons! You piece of shit!" The screaming voice of a brutish male dragon brought me out of my thoughts. The kishunimara hissed as she tackled the black-scaled dragon.

"Don't hurt friend!" The black dragon howled in pain as the kishunimara bit into his shoulder. She had him pinned to the ground, completely defenceless. In front of them, Oryps had picked up the injured Telia who had fallen to the ground.

"Ausstralia, sstop. He won't hurt uss," the kishunimara scowled at the dragon and swallowed the chunk of flesh that she had bitten off, then she stood up obediently like a trained puppy. The dragon growled at Oryps, then he turned his head to the side and vomited a dark black fluid onto the ground.

"How the fuck can you walk around when you're so fucking sick?" The black dragon growled with every single word he spoke. He looked like he was in agony and the blood loss from his newly acquired wound didn't seem to be making him feel any better.

"Practice and a good resst with good company makess it eassier," the kishunimara smiled for just a moment, then she immediately resumed scowling at the black dragon. The dragon hissed at the purple-scaled dragon who held my Telia in his arms.

"You're gonna get yourself and me killed, you fucking idiot! Does that not mean anything to you!?" A moment of tense silence followed after the dragon had screamed. In all of my years in the quiet little town I had never seen anyone radiate hatred like that dragon did, and I had seen zombies mutilate my family.

"Whatever, you don't fucking care, do you? I could die, you could die, the whole fucking world could end and it wouldn't matter as long as your fucking prince is safe, right? That's all you fucking care about, don't even try to fucking deny it," the black dragon turned his back to the purple-scaled dragon and he ran away before he could receive an answer.

"Oryps, do you remember what Tanin'iver said? She said that your copy was buried and dead," the dragon shook his head and walked forward, carrying the unicorn in his arms like a human male would hold his bride.

"Tanin'iver lied, Telia, sshe- Ah-choo!" The purple-scaled dragon sneezed and I almost revealed myself to the small group by leaping into their line of sight to help her. Luckily for my beloved Telia, the dragon never allowed her to fall.

Telia's eyes were wide with concern and she gently placed her hoof on his forehead as the dragon continued to walk. "Oryps, your forehead feels so hot. Tell me, what is this sickness you've got?"

Oryps didn't say a single word to answer Telia's question and he continued to walk. The kishunimara continued to follow them and I knew that she was aware of my presence because she would routinely turn her head to face me every few seconds. Either I was being too loud, or the kishunimaras ears were incredibly strong.

Eventually, the trio stopped walking and stood in front of the Rock Of Souls. Telia seemed to struggle as she raised her hoof and I almost revealed myself to the trio to try to console her. The rock started to glow and I was shocked to see what looked like a strange world filled with shadows and light appear within the rock.

"Telia, I don't think that Than wantss to ssee you. Are you ssure that you want to do thiss?" Telia nodded her head without hesitation, and Oryps immediately stepped into the world of light with the kishunimara following behind him.

\---

My daughter despised me.

What did I do wrong? I tried everything that I could to save her life and I followed her to the afterlife just to be with her, yet she still hated me. Why did she hate me so? It was not my fault that she died. If I was being honest, it wasn't anybody's fault.

She died because she was sick, she wasn't strong enough to survive and there wasn't anything I could do to save her. If my beautiful baby girl had been able to hold onto her life for just a few seconds, a minute at most, I could have saved her.

What was the point of having all the powers of a deity if I couldn't save my family? Oryps would die long before Thorn grew up to be a fully-grown dragon-unicorn and my daughter was already dead. Sir Phobos, my brother, might as well have been dead to me.

I didn't want to say that I hated Thorn, but I didn't love him. Every time I saw him I was reminded of the beautiful baby girl that would have been his sister if the deity hadn't decided to punish me by denying me what I had always wanted.

When I was a little girl I left my brother so that I could travel to Vanhoover and train with King Priapism. The small deformed dragon became my mentor and he taught me how to use my magic to do incredible things. We were never very close, but he respected my power and he asked me to be his representative in a small town filled with magic-users. I didn't even think that anyone bothered to name the town and if they did they didn't tell me.

Sir Phobos never forgave me for leaving him. He thought that we would always be together, but he was wrong to think that. I felt bad for him because I knew how much he had lost and how much he cared about me. But, I had to follow my own destiny just like he had followed his.

Was the deity playing a joke on me? My destiny was to marry the most handsome prince in the entire world, then bear the weight of his children and suffer grief when my perfect daughter died before she'd even had a chance to experience life. My brother's destiny was to become the greatest unicorn soldier the world had ever seen, then become the closest ally that King Priapism had, and then become the king's representative in the biggest colony in the largest settlement in the world. How was that fair?

I knew that I made a mistake by forcing Oryps into marrying me. It was a stupid thing to do to fall in love with a gay dragon who was also one of the princes of snakes. But, when I watched him crawl into our town with his dying brother on his back, I knew that I would fall in love with him because I found myself wishing that someone would do the same thing for me.

Long ago, the unicorns in my town used to offer their children as sacrifices to the snakes as thanks for their service in guarding the mythical cave. It was said that an ancient evil slept in the cave and it would remain sleeping only as long as the snakes guarded it. Oryps and Asthma both told me the same thing, which was that the ancient evil sleeping in the cave was the legendary Xnoy.

The unicorns stopped sacrificing their children to the snakes when Asthma took the place of his father as the king of the snakes. Asthma was a kindhearted snake who understood that the unicorns would eventually refuse to sacrifice their children if the barbaric practice was allowed to continue. He claimed that under his rule, no snake would ever eat another unicorn unless the unicorn attempted to free Xnoy.

Some snakes believed that the unicorns should continue to sacrifice their young to them and they started to attack our village so that they could eat our young. Asthma and I dealt with the wicked snakes, but some unicorns in my town believed that the attacks would continue to happen unless all the snakes were killed.

We reached an agreement when we decided that I would marry the prince of snakes, which would make me a princess of snakes. We invited the unicorns who believed that the only way to end the conflict between snakes and unicorns was with war, to witness us ending the conflict with love.

If I was being honest, I didn't care about the stupid conflict, I just saw it as an opportunity to marry the dragon who I loved. We didn't need to have a child, but I really wanted to have a little girl to raise.

I wanted to raise a little girl to prove that I could be a better caregiver to her than my brother had been for me. My brother had fed me, he had given me shelter, he told me stories about his adventures in faraway places every night before I fell asleep and he always made sure that I was safe in my bed as I slept.

He was a good big brother to me, but he stopped loving me when I left him. I needed to prove to myself that I could be better than him by refusing to not love my little girl, no matter what she did or said.

"What are you doing here, baby?" Ambrosia's irritating voice brought me out of my thoughts. Oryps smiled at his friend and the kishunimara growled.

"Bitch," the kishunimara whispered with a low-pitched rasp that the dead female dragon either didn't hear or simply didn't acknowledge. Oryps wrapped his tail around the ghostly blue form of the dragon who had once been his living friend.

"Ambrossia, it'ss good to ssee a friendly face. Iss my mother here too?" The dragon ghost frowned and she nodded her head.

"My beloved is too busy with her other lover to talk to you or me right now, baby," there was so much bitterness in her voice. Oryps didn't seem surprised to learn about the other lover of his mother and I suspected that Ambrosia wasn't surprised either. But, she was so insecure, so the fact that Aishiteru could still love someone after loving her for a short time must have hurt her deeply.

I had seen Ambrosia a few times and I didn't think that she ever referred to Aishiteru by her name even once. That was a bit strange for someone's mate. Did she even know Aishiteru's name?

"It isn't fair, baby! It just isn't, baby! Just because she has a terrible mental disability doesn't mean she's better than me, baby! In fact, it just means that she doesn't love her as much as me, baby. She's just being really nice to her because she's retarded, baby," I felt sorry for the dragon who was going to such extreme lengths to twist the narrative.

"Ambrossia, sshe hass ssome kind of amnessia. Every ssingle day since sshe'ss died sshe probably had to wake up, realize that sshe had died and that her beloved Aisshiteru wass sstill alive. Sshe needss her attention right now more than you do," the female dragon scoffed rudely.

"She doesn't remember a single one of those days, baby," Oryps shook his head and the kishunimara growled even though I doubted that she fully understood the conversation the two dragons were having.

"That doessn't mean that thosse dayss didn't happen," the female dragon turned her head to avoid the gaze of the male dragon who I had married. "Why are you here, baby? You obviously aren't here to see me, baby."

"You're right, I didn't come to ssee you," the grip of the dragon's tail tightened, but it just ended up phasing through the ghost dragon. "I hoped that you wouldn't be here. I didn't want to ssee you here, Ambrossia, any more than I wanted to ssee my daughter here," the female dragon's head whipped around quickly as soon as Oryps mentioned my daughter.

"You have a daughter, baby," Oryps nodded his head. "You never told me, baby."

  
  



	11. The Book of Oryps: Chapter 12 - Regretting Than

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I would like to re-write this entire story when I'm done with it. I don't think I will be finished with it until it is good enough for someone else to like it, for someone to leave a comment on it.
> 
> I kinda wish that someone working on The Boys with a Twitter following would mention this story in a tweet, just to give it a bit of exposure, if only for just being weird and kinda bad. I just want this story to get some form of attention, good or bad, it isn't good for my mental health to have something I've worked so hard on just be ignored.
> 
> Something that I would like to do is write 3000 fanfictions for my story. It's just a weird goal of mine. I can write a decent drabble in about 20 minutes. So, like, at minimum, it would take about 10000 hours to do, or about 10 fanfictions a day for a year. That takes either a lot of motivation or a lot of weed.

_ I feel so lonely. _

My mother was a weak unicorn and it was because I didn't get enough of my father's strength that I died. Thorn got my father's wings, his claws and his wonderful dragon horns. What did I get? I got his forked tongue. Yay for me.

I would have had my mother's magical powers if I had survived and that might have been cool. Magic was pretty much useless in the realm of spirits. Magic only worked on living creatures, not dead ones.

There were only three areas of light in the spirit realm, one area for the spirits of dragons, one for the griffins and one for the spirits of unicorns. Zbis controlled two of the areas, as well as the dark areas of the realm. She had told me that she had always controlled the realm of the spirits with her sister, Xnoy. She and Xnoy had to leave the realm to liberate the dragons from the humans after they received a call for help by a brave young dragon.

They had planned to return to the realm of the dead after the dragons had been liberated and the humans were all dead. What the two didn't expect to see was that a number of dragons had formed romantic and platonic relationships with certain humans.

The humans who had earned and accepted the affections of the dragons were allowed to live. Zbis and her sister stayed in the realm of the living to rule over the living dragons. But they vowed that one day they would return to the realm of the dead to reclaim their places as the rulers of the dead.

Zbis noticed that Xnoy envied the dragons who loved their humans in a way that she felt like she had never been loved. It hurt Zbis to see her sister yearn for something that it seemed like she would never have. Zbis promised her sister that she would never be alone and she gave her a very special gift. She went to the realm of the dead and offered rebirth to a single dragon who could complete five trials to prove that they were worthy of the love of Xnoy.

100 dragons completed the five trials and Zbis was delighted. She knew that her sister would adore having 100 dragon lovers and she hoped that she would never see her sister sad again.

Xnoy had adored having 100 dragon lovers, but eventually, she confessed to her sister that she wanted to have a "Fairytale romance."

Xnoy wanted to fall in love with a handsome prince or princess who would pledge his or her undying love for her. Then they would live happily ever after in their cave. She didn't want 100 dragons to be given to her as a gift.

Zbis was upset when she heard the revelation, but she rationalized that eventually Xnoy would grow to truly love the 100 dragons and forget about her fantasy. What she had not expected was for Xnoy to meet Saffire.

"Every night I pray to the deity of creation that Xnoy will die and I will get the opportunity to apologize for what I did," Zbis would tearfully say to me. "I was wrong, I shouldn't have done what I did."

"What did you do?" Zbis turned away from me when I asked the question.

Since I was the only dragon-unicorn hybrid, with the exception of my brother, Zbis created a small area just for me in the realm of the dead. It got very lonely sometimes, which was something that Zbis was aware of. That's why she regularly visited me and she allowed my father to visit me whenever he wanted.

My father told me that he and Telia mostly kept their marriage a secret from their colonies. Few dragons knew that my father was married to Telia and few unicorns knew that Telia was married to my father.

It was not a secret that I loved my father more than I loved Telia. That weak unicorn was the reason why I died. If I had been as lucky as Thorn and I received more of my father's strength, I would have survived. Thorn got my father's wings and his talons, I got his tail.

Telia visited me regularly, but I rarely ever spoke to her. She was desperate to get me to talk to her, which was pathetic. I had heard her yell at my father and I had seen the hurt in Thorn's eyes. He had to go to sleep every night in Telia's home and he had to listen to her fight with my father.

My father was such a kind dragon, he always made sure to tell me all about his adventures when he visited me. He told me about how he defeated an army of shapechangers, he told me about how he saved a group of baby dragons from a pack of kishunimaras who had wandered into the valley. He also told me about my grandfather.

"Father," I tried to place my hoof on his shoulder and I cursed inside my head. He was alive, I was dead, the only way that I could touch him was if he was dead just like me. My father was always so kind to me, he seemed to know what I was thinking without me saying a single word.

He placed his talons on my beautiful tail and started to lightly stroke it. I couldn't feel anything, and he knew that, but for just a moment it was nice to pretend like we could touch each other, just like a father and daughter should.

"Ssweetheart, your heart iss heavy. Will you tell me why?" There was always something wrong with me. I always wished that my father would die so that I could be with him forever. I always made sure to try to make him stay as long as possible by asking him stupid questions.

"Father, why did you marry Telia?" I had never asked that question before. I had always assumed that my father loved Telia and that was why they got married. Beneath all of the coldness and the fighting, there had to have been a love that existed between them at some point. I had hoped that maybe my death was what caused their relationship to break.

"Than, we were forced to get married," my father looked directly into my eyes. His piercing gaze made me want to look away, but I couldn't. Seeing such a powerful and stoic look in my father's eyes hypnotized me.

"Your grandfather, the king of ssnakess, wanted me to produce an heir and he wanted there to be peace between ssnakess and unicornss. Ssnakes would eat unicornss, and unicornss would hunt ssnakess for their venom," my father reached out his talon and gently placed it on my mouth. I smiled and I allowed my tongue to slip out of my mouth. My father was always amused when he saw my tongue.

"Your grandfather wass sso excited to have a granddaughter. When I told him that Telia wass pregnant with twinss, he wass overjoyed. He wanted nothing more than to ssee hiss little princessss grow up," on the rare occasions when my father would mention my grandfather, he would tell me about his kindness and the love he felt for all of the snakes in his kingdom.

"When I sshowed him your body, he assked to ssee your tongue. He wass sso proud of your tongue and when he tassted your venom he excitedly proclaimed that you had ssecreted royal venom. Do you know how rare that iss?" I shook my head. I had always known that my purple venom was unique, but I had no idea that it was something that was valued among snakes.

"My father ssecretess royal venom, but none of hiss children ssecreted royal venom, not even me. He wass convinced that I would give him a child that would ssecrete the sspecial venom and replace him ass king or queen," a darkness appeared in the eyes of my father.

"Then he found out that I wass gay, and it broke hiss heart. That'ss the main reasson why he forced me to marry Telia. He assssumed that if I had ssex with a unicorn and raissed a child, my homossexuality would be cured," my tongue tightened around his talon and I felt my entire body tense.

"Father, y-y-you," he nodded his head.

"Yess, Than, I'm gay. But, that doessn't matter," I wanted to say that his sexuality didn't matter, but it did. I didn't know why it made me uncomfortable, and I didn't like the weird feeling in my stomach that I felt when I thought about him kissing another male dragon.

"Father, do you regret having, er, doing, er, the..." I didn't want to finish asking my question. "Well, you know..." My father smiled at me as he picked me up and held me in his arms. I imagined that I could feel his talons gently rub my belly and I giggled lightly.

"Than, I don't regret marrying Telia becausse it made my father happy. I don't regret being with Telia becausse me and her brought you into thiss world. I love you, my dear daughter, and I alwayss will. You're my little angel," when Telia called me an angel, I hated it, but I loved when my father called me an angel. It made me feel special.

\---

"Than, you have a visitor," Zbis said. I didn't look away from the ball of light I had been playing with. Zbis had given me the ball of light as a gift for my birthday, Telia had given me a small dagger made out of cursemetal and my grandfather had given me a piece of his shed skin.

My father knew me better than anyone and he had given me a stuffed dragon that he had found during a visit to the city. As a ghost, I had the ability to possess certain objects, but since I belonged to the light in the realm of the dead I could only possess an object for a small amount of time. I was only allowed to leave the realm of the dead for a couple of hours when I possessed the stuffed dragon, but that was enough time for what I wanted to do.

My father took the stuffed dragon that I had possessed to my grandfather so that I could meet him for the first time. My father had been right when he said that my grandfather would adore me. He referred to me as his little princess and he claimed that I would have been his favorite grandchild if I had lived.

While it was incredible to meet my grandfather, the best part of my birthday was to be held by my father for the first time in my life. It was so nice to feel his touch instead of feeling absolutely nothing at all.

"Who is it?" I asked the goddess who had been more of a mother to me than my own mother simply because I allowed her to act like a mother to me. My real mother, Telia, was the reason why I died, so why would I want a relationship with her?

"Your father, your mother, and someone I had hoped to never see again," I growled. I really didn't want to see Telia but I desperately wanted to see my father. He visited two times every month, but I wanted to see him far more often. A daily visit would have been nice.

"Tell Telia that she can wait outside," the giant goddess surprised me when she shook her head and stared at me with a stern expression.

"Than, if I can talk to Saffire, you can talk to your mother. We'll do this together," I shook my head and I stared directly into her eyes.

"You are my mother and I won't let anyone tell me otherwise. You were the one who was there for me when I had no one else. You took care of me like a mother should and that bitch..." I wasn't sure how Zbis would react to what I would say, but I felt that it was important for me to say it.

"I saw how she treated my brother. She rejected him, she forced her baby to leave and my kind-hearted father took care of him when he had no one else, just like you did for me," the tears stung as they flowed down my face. It was so hard to remember what I had seen, so hard to remember watching Telia neglect and reject my brother.

I hoped that Zbis would understand.

\---

"I won't let you see her unless you leave her mother here," I didn't know why I expected to hear anything different. My baby girl would never want to see me as long as I lived. Maybe sometime after my death she would finally want to talk with me.

"Zbiss, pleasse let uss all through. Sshe hass a broken leg and I don't want to leave her here," the massive dragon deity refused to move to allow us to pass. There was nothing I could do to make her move, nothing Oryps could say that would change her mind, and Saffire probably wouldn't be much help. The stealthy little ghost was so quiet and remained out of sight so often that most of the time I forgot that she was even around.

"She won't be alone, I'll watch over her while Saffire and I speak," Oryps didn't seem like he was happy to hear that, but he obviously expected that our daughter wouldn't want to speak to me. Although I didn't fully understand why she hated me so much, I would have to be extremely oblivious to not realize how much she wanted to avoid me.

"Oryps, my husband, it is fine. I'll speak to her another time," he didn't put me down, instead he just stared at Zbis as if he expected the massive dragon to change her mind.

"Zbiss, I want to take Than out of thiss place and bring her to her grandfather," why would he want to do that? "I think that I will need her with me to convince my father to let me free your ssisster."

The eyes of Zbis widened and I heard a quiet cheer from Saffire who I guessed was floating behind me. Saffire floated in front of Oryps and I saw a big smile form on the face of the admittedly cute ghost dragon.

"Are you really gonna free Xnoyby? That's wonderful! I kinda thought that m-maybe you wouldn't, but you are and that's w-w-wonderful! You're such a n-n-nice dragon, Xnoyby w-will l-l-love that about you," her devotion to the monstrous Xnoy was cute. She must have been blinded by love if she could ignore the fact that Xnoy was a horrid creature who was directly responsible for the extinction of humans.

Well, the griffins were also directly responsible for the extinction of humans, but it would be disingenuous not to mention the role that Xnoy played in their demise.

Oryps had told me about the griffins, but I had suspected that creatures like them must have existed before he told me. In the past, before unicorns purged the world of pegasuses and horses that were intelligent enough to be able to speak, the pegasuses would write down stories of winged beasts living in the clouds. I always thought that if humans really did leave and built a new life on another planet they would have returned unless something terrible had happened to them.

The sad truth was that our planet was the only planet in the entire universe that had intelligent life on it. Unicorns had known that for centuries, but humans were unwilling to accept the truth. We discovered that fact when we used our magic to scan the entire universe looking for another lifeform that could communicate with us. We found absolutely nothing and we truly realized the value of our planet, as well as the value of life itself.

Oddly enough, when we scanned the entire universe we didn't find any trace of the griffins in the clouds. So, it was possible that they managed to somehow hide themselves from our magic. That meant that there was a possibility that there was another sapient species in the universe that was simply hiding from us.

When I learned that the humans didn't return I hypothesized that maybe they had been killed by another species or they had killed themselves somehow. I was elated when I learned that my hypothesis had been correct. The humans had never returned to Earth because they had been killed by the griffins and the resources they loaded up their spaceships with had been used by the griffins.

"Xnoy is very dangerous and she shouldn't be free. However..." The massive dragon paused for a moment. "I have missed my sister and I have long waited for the opportunity to apologize for what I have done," she pointed one of her massive talons at me.

"Than is like a daughter to me and she doesn't want to see her. If you take her away from this place, you need to promise me that Telia won't say a single word to her. I don't want to see her upset," Oryps chuckled and he wiggled the stump where his talons used to be.

"I think that sshe'll already be pretty upsset when sshe sseess thiss."

\---

"Who did this to you?" My daughter's righteous fury was something that I loved about her, and the fact that I didn't often see it made me appreciate it even more. I loved my daughter, and it was kind of nice to know that she was in a place where no one could ever hurt her. Thorn could get killed, but Than couldn't because she was already dead.

"I thought you could ssee everything," Than folded her arms in a way that reminded me of Ekips. "Zbis won't let me do that all the time, just sometimes. Every other ghost gets to do it whenever they want, but not me," there was a light smile on her face. She knew that if she complained about something I would inevitably say something to cheer her up.

"You're not like the other ghosstss. You're my little princessss," her smile brightened my day and warmed my heart. I knew that soon I would be able to spend every single moment with my precious daughter. Before the sun set, I knew that I would be dead.

"Assthma and the resst of the ssnakess alsso think that you're a princessss. Would you like to vissit them?" Her eyes widened and within a second she started floating around the space cheering like her birthday had come early. She loved seeing me and she loved seeing her grandfather. But, she was more excited to see her grandfather because she rarely had the opportunity to do so. I knew that Asthma wouldn't mind seeing his princess, and in fact, he would most likely love an unexpected visit.

He probably wouldn't like the fact that I was going to release Xnoy into the world. I hoped that seeing his granddaughter would put him in a good enough mood that he would trust me to do what I thought was right. Xnoy needed to be free to be with her lover and if I could somehow stop Priapism from controlling her, I knew that Saffire would make sure that Xnoy never hurt anyone again.

"Yes! I can't wait to get out of here! I'll just grab my stuffie and we'll go, right? You don't have to do anything before we go, right?" Her ghostly form was already beginning to disappear into the stuffed animal floating in the strange void where she lived. The place would be my home soon, and even though my daughter would be there, I knew that I would always miss the land of the living after I died. That would be my last chance to take Than outside that place and the last chance for her to see her grandfather.

"No, my ssweet princessss, we don't have to do anything. We can go right now," I picked up the stuffed dragon with the only talons that I had left and I carried it to the exit.

As soon as I passed through the white rectangle of light, I saw Telia staring regretfully at me and our daughter. She looked like she wanted to say something, but she just looked away from us as soon as she got a brief glimpse of her daughter. I knew that Than saw Telia's reaction to us and she must have felt some satisfaction when she saw how her presence impacted the mother whom she hated. Maybe if Than had made an effort to bond with her mother Telia would have allowed me to be more involved in Thorn's life. Instead, Telia pushed me away from my son and I feared that when I died my son would travel down a dark path.

Zbis was talking with Saffire a fair distance away from me. I couldn't hear what they were saying, but Saffire seemed to be smiling while Zbis seemed like she was apologizing for the mistakes she had made. It was difficult to tell what Zbis might have been saying or feeling, but I hoped that she regretted what she had done and was earnestly trying to make things right with Saffire.

"Place death, ghosts. No friends, no family," Australia said to herself as she looked around for kishunimara ghosts that she would never see. Kishunimaras, like a number of creatures, didn't have souls. In a way, that made them lucky. Creatures like dolphins and humans did have souls, but they lacked the spiritual connection that dragons had. As a result, dragon ghosts went to the blue realm when they died, unicorns went to the red realm, griffins went to the yellow realm and every creature without a spiritual connection went to the dark place.

Since Australia didn't have a soul, she wouldn't go anywhere when she died, she would just be gone forever. I had the luck of knowing exactly what would happen to me when I died, but Australia would have to live the rest of her life knowing that when she died she would be gone forever, unless I lied to her. I never liked lying, but sometimes it was better to lie to make someone feel good than to tell the truth and allow them to feel bad.

"Kisshunimarass don't go here when they die, they go ssomewhere elsse," I believed that she realized that I was lying to her, but she smiled anyways. She pressed her body against me and nuzzled me gently. Than smiled in approval as she watched the beast show her affection for me and out of the corner of my eye I could see Telia growl lowly to herself.

"New friend?" The long serpentine tail of Australia poked the stuffed dragon that Than was temporarily using as a body. "Friend soft," the serpentine tail applied a little bit more pressure to the plush dragon. Than winced in pain and the kishunimara immediately pulled back her tail.

"Ausstralia, thiss iss my daughter, and her name iss Than," I wondered if the kishunimara would be confused about the fact that my daughter had the body of a plush dragon. "Than, thiss iss Ausstralia and sshe'ss my friend."

"I like her already," the statement was obviously said in order to make Telia feel even worse. I loved Telia, I loved Than, so seeing how she hurt Telia brought me no pleasure. I looked to the side and I saw that Telia had disappeared.

Her leg was crippled and it must have been so difficult for her to lift her hoof to use her magic to transport herself away from us. The pain she must have endured just to get herself away from her daughter, one of the few unicorns she could claim to love, must have been terrible. Knowing Than, she probably loved thinking about her mother in pain.

"Okay, now that we all know each other, we need to get to Xnoy. Zbiss, are you done with her lover?" I turned my head to look at the enormous dragon who was smiling as she looked down at the ghost dragon. Saffire grinned and floated over to me as quickly as she could.

"Oryps, please, bring my sister back to me. I'm finally ready to make this right, to fix the mistake I made so long ago," a thought occurred to me and I felt like an idiot for not thinking about it sooner. I had been in the place filled with the spirits of the dead a few times and I had never seen any of the 100 dragons that had been Xnoy's lovers.

"Zbiss, before I leave, I need to know ssomething," Zbis didn't protest, she simply nodded her head. "Where are the 100 dragonss?"

She stiffened and she turned her head away from me. She wasn't afraid of me knowing the truth, she wasn't afraid of me, she was afraid about saying the truth out loud so that she would have to acknowledge it. Why was she so afraid?

"I don't know," what kind of an answer was that? "What do you mean you don't know? How could you losse 100 dragonss?"

"They never came to this realm, they stayed in the realm of the living and I don't know where they are," she wasn't telling me the whole truth. She might not have known for sure where they were, but she had an idea.

\---

_ I love Xnoy. _

With every passing day some things get harder to remember and I can feel the madness threatening to destroy everything that I am. We all try to stop the madness from overtaking us by reciting the same mantra every single morning.

_ I love Xnoy. _

If we love Xnoy, then why do we hide from her? Why did Shade, our leader, tell us to extinguish our light so that she doesn't see us? Shade says that we would scare her if she saw us and our light would attract the evil creatures who would take Xnoy away from us.

We whisper to her every minute of every day. We tell her that we love her and we want to be with her in the spirit realm where we can finally touch her like we used to do. Ghosts were never meant to leave the spirit realm and although a few ghosts can be outside of the spirit realm for centuries without going mad, the madness claims everyone. The only thing that stops the madness is keeping focused. As long as we remind ourselves that we love Xnoy, the madness can't claim us, and the second we forget that we love Xnoy is when the madness will attempt to claim our sanity.

_ I love Xnoy. _

I love Xnoy. Those words are still true to me after so many recitations. I don't even remember why I love Xnoy, or if she has ever loved me, but the words still mean something to me. Maybe someday, Xnoy will love all of us again like Shade said that she once did.

_ I love Xnoy. _

I love Xnoy. I know that I love Xnoy, but I forgot what my name is. Who was I when I was alive? Is the only thing about me that matters that I loved Xnoy? Am I just a faceless ghost along with the rest of these faceless ghosts?

_ I love Xnoy. _

Shade is the only one here who has a name that everyone knows. Shade says that he was the leader of our group when we were alive. He said that we were chosen to love Xnoy and to make sure that Xnoy was always happy.

When I see her in pain, it hurts me because I love her and my purpose is to make her happy. None of us are making her happy, all we're doing is causing her pain and watching as the madness slowly consumes her mind.

_ I love Xnoy. _

"Stop having doubts, you need to stay focused," Shade's silky soft voice was probably what made Xnoy choose him as her favorite until the evil dragon corrupted her mind. Shade loved all of us ghosts, but he loved Xnoy far more than any of us and because of that love he hated the evil dragon who he claimed manipulated her.

Shade said that the reason why we do what we do, whispering into the ear of the enormous dragon, is so that she will one day be happy again like she once was when we were all alive. He claimed that she was sad now, not because of the evil dragon who manipulated her, but because she couldn't be with us like she had once been.

_ I love Xnoy. _

I love Xnoy. Every time I say those words it gets a little bit more difficult to convince myself that I truly love Xnoy with all of my heart.

"If we don't love Xnoy, we have no purpose," Shade seemed to have a supernatural sense of what each of us were thinking at all times.

_ I love Xnoy. _

\---

"Granddaughter, the prettiessst of all the pretty princessssssesssesss in the world. Why have you and your father come here to brighten my morning?" The journey to my grandfather was quick. We walked at a leisurely pace through the valley to get to the snakes. The kishunimara seemed apprehensive when she saw all of the snakes and the ghost dragon had been shivering and whimpering ever since we met the snake guarding the main path.

"Isss ssshe okay?" The guard snake had asked us. Oryps had told him that it didn't matter and that he needed to take her to his grandfather. The guard snake had known better than to argue with his prince.

"Father, I brought Than here sso that you could have a nice vissit with her. I know how much you love sseeing her," my grandfather nodded his head. "Indeed I do, but I sssussspect you have another motive. I'm not blind, Orypsss, I see your collar, but I don't sssee your wingsss or your talonsss. Who hurt you, my ssson?"

"Priapissm, father, a deformed dragon named Priapissm. He wants me to awaken Xnoy," I heard a violent hissing from the snakes in the pit as soon as my father had finished speaking. My grandfather had a less visceral reaction, but he didn't seem pleased when he heard the words.

"I assssssume that he will kill you if you don't comply with hisss demandsss," my father nodded his head. "Not jusst me, all of you. He'ss going to releasse Xnoy no matter what we do, but if I releasse her now, we might have a chance to sstop him ssomehow," the dragon paused. He stared up at my grandfather with pleading eyes.

"Father..." He hesitated. "Father, thiss iss the only way that we'll get to live. You have to undersstand."

My grandfather was silent for a few moments. His eyesight drifted between his son, the ghost who stood behind my father, and the numerous snakes whispering to each other in the pit. He needed to make a decision and I had complete confidence that he would make the right one.

"Your mother didn't visssit me when the sssun ssset," my father said nothing. "Isss thisss dragon the reassson for her absssence?" My father continued to remain silent because nothing needed to be said. My grandfather already knew the answer that he would have received if my father had broken the silence.

"When I awoke in the night, I sssaw a blue moon in the sssky. Wasss thisss alssso the work of that dragon?" My father nodded his head yet again and I could hear gasping from a number of the snakes watching their king talking to their prince. They were as afraid of the mysterious dragon as they should have been.

"Orypsss, thisss dragon could kill usss all. He doesssn't need you, so why did he sssend you?" A single twitch of an eye apparently gave my grandfather the answer he needed.

"I sssee, he gave you a quessst. A blue moon, Xnoy, it makesss sssenssse that he would enjoy sssuch thingsss. An experienced knight, a quessst to find a treasssure, but where isss the prince?" The tip of my grandfather's tail gently stroked the back of my father. "My prince isss right here, but thisss king must have a prince asss well, hmmm?"

"You're ass perceptive ass ever, father. There wass a prince with me, but we were sseparated," the tip of his tail rubbed against my plush body. Both my father and grandfather had something they wanted to say to each other, but neither of them wanted to say it in front of me.

"Orypsss, my ssson, the prince of sssnakesss. I have denied many creaturesss accessssss to the cave. But, I ssshall not deny you. Pleassse, enter, and may the deity sssmile upon you," my father tried to take a step forward, but my grandfather's tail held him back.

"All that I asssk isss that you leave my princessssss with me. There are sssome thingsss no child ssshould sssee," I didn't know what to say. My father looked down at my plush dragon body as if he was seeking my permission to leave. I didn't want him to go into the cave without me, but if my grandfather didn't want me to go then I Believed that I should listen to him.

I had known Zbis for the entire time I had been dead and she told me that Xnoy was the most beautiful dragon in the entire world. But, she claimed that after the terrible event that ended with Xnoy killing Zbis, she changed into something much uglier. According to Zbis, a madness had overtaken her mind, and the madness had poisoned her body for many years. In her cave, she hid her ugliness from the world.

"Go on father, I'll be fine and so will you," I lifted the arm of the plush dragon and I pointed to the kishunimara. "You have someone to protect you and I have someone to protect me. We'll both be fine."

"Friend safe with me!" I wished that the kishunimara had been my mother instead of Telia. She would have never turned her back on Thorn, she would have always made sure that my father felt loved and maybe I wouldn't have died if she had given birth to me.

This kishunimara could have been everything I ever wanted in a real mother. She would have loved me, she would have cared for me, she would have protected me from the evils in the world. Most importantly, she would have loved my father and she would have shown him how much she appreciated him every day. She also wouldn't fight with him like Telia did.

"A kissshunimara wanting to protect a sssnake isss like a rat wanting to protect a cat. It warmsss my heart, young one," my grandfather was a carnivore who ate living creatures to survive. It made me feel terrible to think about my kind-hearted grandfather eating an entire kishunimara whole while it begged for its life.

How many creatures had my grandfather eaten during his life? Did he feel bad about eating so many living creatures, or did he just kill without feeling remorse?

"Ssaffire, you have to come with uss," the ghost was shivering as she stared at my grandfather from behind a rock. "Pleasse, Ssaffire, Xnoy iss waiting for you insside. Sshe'ss been waiting for you for sso long, do you want her to wait for you for another hundred yearss?"

She remained silent and she refused to look away from the giant snake. His attempt at a reassuring smile only seemed to make her more terrified than she was. If I was being honest, even though I loved my grandfather I would gladly admit that his smiles were pretty scary.

"I'm s-s-scared," the words didn't need to have been spoken, everyone could already tell that the ghost was terrified. My father walked up to the ghost slowly as if he wanted to comfort her, but the kishunimara ran to the ghost as quickly as possible. The kishunimara attempted to hug her, but she ended up falling down.

The fact that she couldn't touch the ghost didn't deter her. She stood up and smiled widely at the terrified ghost.

"Friend, we protect you! No worry, no fear," her bright and happy voice could have shined a light into the darkest of souls. The ghost looked away from my grandfather and focused entirely on the smiling kishunimara.

"D-do you p-p-promise I'll be s-s-safe with you," she was a ghost, of course she would be safe. No living creature could possibly hurt her. It made no sense for her to be afraid.

"Promise, friend safe!"

\---

My name was Isolde, but that name was kind of lame so I named myself something more fun. My fun name was Cupcake and I worked in a bakery making the tastiest sugary treats in my little town.

I was a griffin, and like every griffin I lived in a house made out of gold. When I was a little girl my teacher told us that the humans travelled from their cities down on Earth to our cities in the clouds to escape from something bad. The most powerful griffins used their magic spells to create a barrier that would protect us from the bad things that the humans had escaped from.

But, bad things didn't matter, what mattered was that someone special was coming to the little town and she'd be very hungry when she got there. It was my duty as the best baker in Goldclaw to make sure that she got to eat the sweetest cakes possible! It simply wouldn't be right for her to eat anything else.

I happily bounced out of my bed and I picked up my little white griffin doll from my dresser. I made it myself so that I would have someone to keep me company when I would bake. The owners of the bakery didn't like to bake with me anymore, they preferred to give the customers tea and talk to them.

I wanted to talk to the customers, but the owners said that I wasn't allowed to talk to them anymore. They said that I would make them uncomfortable. But, that wasn't true! I didn't make anyone uncomfortable, ever, I just wanted everyone to have fun and to smile!

Anyways, I started walking downstairs but I stopped halfway down and I ran back to my room. I had almost walked into the kitchen completely naked! That would have been so embarrassing! Could you imagine if the very special visitor had seen me naked? She might have been so... So...

So overtaken with lust that she would rush into the kitchen and kiss me passionately. Then, she would pick me up and carry me to her castle and we would make love for the first time. Then, she would ask me to be her bride and I would accept. We would have a big wedding with cake and all my friends and... Oh, that's right, I didn't have any friends.

Mean thoughts, mean thoughts, I hated having mean thoughts! I just wanted to have fun thoughts about cake, and ice cream, and my doll that looked so much like...

No, she didn't look like her anymore, she used to but then I spilled some frosting on her. She had a stain on her body and Saturn did not have a stain on her body.

I stared at the dresses in my dresser for a few minutes as I thought about which dress would be the perfect one to wear that day. All of them were so pretty, but only one of them was the perfect dress to wear on that particular day. I chose the pink dress with the white roses and the little frills on the edges.

Once I had gotten dressed, I ran down the stairs to the kitchen so that I could get started on baking. I needed to do everything that I would normally do in a workday quickly so that I could focus all of my attention on making the special visitor a special cake.

Cleaning, cookies, cakes, cleaning, cupcakes, biscuits, bread, cleaning, putting things away, cleaning, mixing, then cookies again. Baking treats was so much work, so much waiting, so much cleaning, so much boring. If I didn't have my little white doll to keep me company I wouldn't have had any fun when I was working. That wouldn't be good at all! Everyone should be able to have at least a little bit of fun when they were working!

The bell rang and I heard someone walk inside. I looked at the time and I saw that it was 8:30am. The special visitor wouldn't arrive until 9am or later, so that couldn't have been her. I heard one of the owners talking to the customer, I heard the sound of a bag being packed with cookies, then I heard the customer walk away. I took a peek through the window to see the lucky griffin who had just purchased a bag of freshly baked cookies.

It was Echo, a shy griffin who I sometimes saw walking around town. No one knew much about her aside from the fact that she spent a lot of time in the basement of her parent's house. She didn't have a real job, as far as I knew, but she did occasionally make dresses for griffins to wear when they got married. Apparently, her dresses were gorgeous and she could have started a business selling them, but she didn't want to. I assumed that she just wanted to be treated like a child by her mommy and daddy for her entire life.

"Stop staring at that girl's wings! This is why you're not allowed to interact with customers! You start looking at their wings and then you start fantasizing about them like a weirdo. You just can't do that here," the owner was mad at me again. I wasn't looking at her wings, and quite frankly, I didn't know why other griffins thought that wings were sexy. Saturn's wings looked very nice, but I wouldn't say that they were the reason why I thought that she was beautiful.

"Your cupcakes are burning! Stop going to your dreamland and do your plooking job!" I could smell the terrible smell of burning cupcakes and I immediately ran to the oven to take them out. I was normally a good employee who didn't burn things, but sometimes accidents happened. Sometimes, cookies got burned and sometimes things got spilled, it just happened. That's why I cleaned so much.

The ball rang again, right at 9am when the special visitor was supposed to stop by for a visit. I took a peek through the window to make absolutely sure that the griffin who rang the bell was the griffin I wanted to see.

My heart melted when I saw the beautiful Saturn walk into the bakery with three of her guards trailing behind her. Some nights, before I went to bed, I would imagine Saturn taking me away from that place to her castle and making me her royal baker. I would live happily in her castle making her delicious treats and eventually we would form a loving relationship. After years of hard work, years of delicious treats and years of love, we would get married. I would be a queen and I would use my power to make sure that no one in my kingdom would ever be sad again.

\---

Kersploomugh!

The noise was unlike anything I had ever heard and it was so loud that I could hear it inside the bakery even though it probably came from outside. I covered my ears, yet I could still hear both of the owners yelling.

I ran outside to see what had made the sound. The owners didn't like me leaving the bakery, but I couldn't stay inside when something interesting was happening outside. A crowd had formed beside a water fountain and Echo had already made her way to the center of the crowd, but I didn't care about Echo, I cared about what she was staring at.

"A dragon! That's a dragon! How did a dragon get here?" Some of the voices were quiet, some of the voices were loud, it seemed like everyone wanted to say something about the dragon except for me. The only thing that I cared about was that Saturn was holding on to the dragon as he was lying beside the fountain.

"Umm, f-f-forgive me for a-a-asking, but I really w-w-want to know that you're okay. You don't have to t-tell me if you don't want to though," Echo hid her face with her wing from the beautiful griffin. Saturn momentarily looked away from the dragon and if Echo had been allowing her face to be seen she would have had the pleasure of staring into Saturn's beautiful orange eyes.

"Young one, I'm okay now thanks to the kindness of my new friend. He helped me and now he needs my help," Saturn stood up and a cloud of yellow smoke appeared around the dragon. The purple-scaled dragon was lifted up by the smoke, yet he still didn't move. That made Saturn very upset and I didn't want to see Saturn upset.

"Saturn! Don't be upset! I'll make you a cake and everything will be all righty rooney with pudding and pie!" They laughed, they all laughed at me except for Saturn, Echo and the dragon. They made me feel like an idiot and a failure. Their laughter would have deafened me and crushed my spirit if I had been paying attention to them.

But, I wasn't paying attention to them, I was focusing all of my attention on the beautiful Saturn. She was the only griffin who had never laughed at me and that was why I loved her so much. She smiled at me and she nodded her head.

"A piece of cake sounds lovely, thank you," one of Saturn's royal guards walked through the crowd towards the royal griffin. Saturn's sister had told us all that Saturn would arrive in the town in the morning and she had made sure that her guards would be there when she visited. It seemed strange that her guards were so far away from her when she arrived. Did they not know where she would arrive when she got there?

"Your majesty, your sister has been worried about you. She asked me to escort you to the castle when you arrived," Saturn shook her head. The dragon levitated towards the guard and when the yellow smoke supporting the dragon was directly above the guard, the dragon was gently lowered onto the guard's back.

"This dragon needs a nurse and a nap, make sure that he gets both at the castle," the guard looked like he wanted to protest, but he said nothing. He obediently flapped his wings, and I felt a gust of air tickle my wings as he flew into the air with the dragon on his back.

"Your majesty, your sister insisted that we bring you to her when you arrived," a second guard that I hadn't noticed stood in front of Saturn. I tended to ignore griffins who didn't matter when I had a griffin like Saturn to focus on. She was so nice to look at, and she smelled like chocolate cookies baking in an oven.

"I can assure you that I am as eager to see her as she is to see me. However, I have been away from my kingdom for days in the company of reptiles eating the same food that they eat. I am sure that my sister will understand that I would like to spend a moment sampling some proper griffin food in the company of a griffin before I return to the castle," the guard opened his mouth to say something, but a small cloud of yellow smoke made sure that he remained silent.

"Young one, would you like to accompany me to the local bakery?" For a moment, I thought that she was talking about me and I felt warm in my belly. When Echo nodded her head with a dumb smile on her face, that warmth went away and it was replaced with cold. I felt like someone had put an ice sculpture inside of me.

I went back to the bakery because seeing Echo smiling made me feel sad, which was odd because normally smiling griffins made me happy even when they were smiling because they were hurting me. I arrived in the kitchen and I didn't even have time to greet my plush toy before Saturn entered the bakery with Echo beside her and a crowd of griffins following her.

They should have been following her, everyone should have been following her, everyone did follow her. No one laughed at her, no one told her that she was stupid, they did that to me but never to her. If I was with her, if she loved me like I loved her, no one would ever mock me.

She took a seat at a table and Echo sat in front of her. Saturn told the other griffins to leave her and Echo alone. They listened to her, but they didn't leave, they just sat at other tables in the bakery. One of the owners approached her and took her order. The owner had served Saturn many before because that was her favorite bakery and it had been for a very long time. The owner would tell me how her great-great-great-great-grandmother had baked cakes for Saturn every day when the royal griffin had more free time.

Saturn was so much older than I could even imagine. There were so many things she had seen, so many things she had done that I could never even comprehend. But, I never wanted to think about her as old, to me she would always be eternally young.

If we ever did get together, if she ever did love me, would it matter to her if I died? She was around for centuries before I was born, and she'd be around for many millenniums after I had died. To her, we all must have seemed like nothing more than pets, dogs that she could love for a brief period in her life that she could never love like a wife or a husband. To her, I would never be anything more than a pet, and that was fine because it meant that she would never see Echo as anything more than a pet either.

"Hey! Stop dreaming! Saturn and her date want a cake!" She liked raspberries in her cakes, but she never told the owner that she wanted them. She had been ordering a simple chocolate cake for centuries, but she had always wanted to order something else.

No one knew her like I did. She would have a fake smile on her face when she ordered her chocolate cake, but that tiny twitch, that moment of hesitation as she briefly took a look at the menu told me that she wanted to order something else. Why did she think that she always had to order the same thing?

I tried putting strawberries in her cake, but she didn't like those very much, she smiled as she ate them but I could tell that she was struggling to swallow them. The next time she came in I added blueberries and she liked those a bit better but I knew that she wanted something different.

I added raspberries to her cake the next time she visited and she adored the taste. I had never seen her as happy as she had been when she tasted the raspberries in her cake for the first time. From that day on, whenever I baked her a cake I would make sure that she got to taste the raspberries that made her smile.

"Plook it all! Stop daydreaming! You're supposed to be baking a cake for Saturn and her date!" Ah yes, I was supposed to bake a cake for the griffin I loved to enjoy eating with her date. I could see the blush on Echo's face when she heard the owner yelling at me.

"Yes ma'am," I had never wanted to hurt anyone before, but at that moment I wanted nothing more than to strangle Echo and take her place at the table with Saturn.

\---

"Princessssss, would you like me to tell you a tale?" Me and my grandfather had been waiting for my father to return for what felt like hours. My grandfather had told me that the cave was deep. He said that my father wouldn't get lost and that I shouldn't worry because my father would be able to get out easily if he was in trouble.

He knew that I needed something to distract me from what was happening, which was why he had asked if I wanted to hear a story. Even though we barely ever saw each other he somehow knew so much about me. Only Zbis and my father were closer to me than my grandfather.

"I would love to hear a tale, grandfather," the giant snake smiled and his large tail coiled around me, protecting me from the world outside of his scaly body.

"Thisss will be a ssshort tale, my princessssss."

_ Once upon a time, there was a beautiful princess who lived in a castle made out of gold. She had been married against her will to a wicked king who wanted heirs to continue his legacy. He demanded that the princess give him the heirs that he sought, but every time she gave birth to beautiful children, the princess would murder them as soon as they left her womb. _

_ The king was infuriated and saddened by the behavior of the princess, but he was not the only one who was appalled by what the princess had done. In the shadows, a witch had been shedding tears whenever an innocent baby had been slaughtered. The witch visited the king and requested that he stop impregnating the beautiful princess. She humbly requested that the king use her body instead, allowing her to carry children for him instead of the murderous princess. _

_ The king agreed, but due to his vanity, he made a demand of the witch. He made her swear that his children would live for as long as there were subjects in his kingdom to rule and as long as his castle stood. The witch agreed, on the condition that she be allowed to place a curse on the princess. _

_ The king agreed and they made love that night. The witch became pregnant and she left the room to curse the princess, promising to return that morning with the newly-birthed heirs. _

_ The witch entered the room of the sleeping princess and she told her that she had arrived to curse her. She angrily claimed that every night from that night onward, the princess would be forced to give birth to a hideous beast that she would not be able to kill. When the princess asked why she would not be able to kill them, the witch smiled before she delivered her explanation. _

_ "When you give birth to these creatures, you will adore every scale on their bodies, you will love their horrid wings, you will caress their tails like you would the finest fabrics. You will not be able to kill them because you shall love them more dearly than you have ever loved anyone or anything and your soul will burn with the pain of a thousand stabbings when your fearful subjects murder them." _

_ The princess pleaded with the witch, she cried in front of her as she claimed that she would never kill another child again. The witch refused to acknowledge her cries and she placed the curse upon her, then she watched as the princess gave birth to a baby dragon. _

_ Just as the witch had foretold, the princess adored the baby dragon like she had never adored any of her other babies. The little creature shivered as a cold wind blew through the window, so the princess covered it with a warm blanket and closed the window so that no stray winds could sneak in to stroke the scales of her baby. _

_ The witch left the room and the princess panicked when she realized that her newborn baby would be murdered by one of her servants if it was seen. She knew that to keep her baby safe she would need to leave, or ensure that her servants never got close enough to her baby to kill it. _

_ The princess snuck out of the castle with a blanket wrapped around her baby and she ran into the forest. The baby was hungry, so she attempted to feed him with milk from her breasts, but when his teeth drew blood she knew that she had to feed him something else. _

_ An innocent rabbit walked by and the dragon pounced on it like a cat. _

"Grandfather, what's a cat?" The massive snake king shook his head and waved the tip of his tail. "Thisss isss a very old ssstory that wasss told to my father and hisss father before him. I have never ssseen a cat, and I don't know what they look like. I assssssume that it mussst have been a fearsssome predator."

"A fearsome predator that ate rabbits?" My grandfather nodded his head. "Every predator needsss to ssstart sssomewhere. I usssed to eat rabbitsss when I wasss tiny," I couldn't imagine my grandfather ever being tiny enough to consider hunting rabbits.

"My ssspecial princessssss, if you had lived you would have grown to be as big asss me," I shook my head. I was part dragon and part snake, but I was mostly a weak unicorn. I would have never grown to be much bigger than Telia if I had lived.

"Yesss you would have, I know becaussse I sssaw your venom. You had royal venom, that'sss what would have made you big. My sssweet little princessssss," it broke my heart whenever I visited my grandfather because he would remind me that if I had lived I would have been able to spend as much time as I wanted with a grandfather and a father who loved me dearly.

"Grandfather, can you continue your story?" He smiled and nodded his head. He opened his mouth to speak, but then he stopped himself.

"I'm sssorry princessssss. Where wasss I in the ssstory?" I giggled and I reminded him that he had just told me about the baby dragon pouncing on the rabbit in the forest like a cat. He smiled and he continued the story from where he had left off.

_ A tasty rabbit strolled by and the baby dragon pounced on it like a cat. He messily devoured the beast in front of his mother, then he offered her the head of the animal. She politely refused and the dragon ate the head. _

_ By the end of the night, the princess and the baby dragon had set up a small camp in the middle of the forest. The princess attempted to make a fire to keep them warm, but when she had assembled a collection of small sticks she realized that she had no idea how to start a fire. She sobbed, she shivered and the baby dragon wanted to make his mother happy. He walked up to the pile of sticks and he shocked the princess by exhaling fire from his small lungs onto the sticks. _

_ In the castle, the witch unexpectedly walked into the bedroom of the king with the intent of giving birth to the heirs he desired in front of him. When she entered the room, she found the king attempting to produce heirs with one of his maids. The witch was outraged and she claimed that she would place a curse upon the king. _

_ She told him that the children inside of her, as well as every child that he had ever fathered, would be transformed into hideous beasts. She gave birth to two beautiful daughters in front of him, then she left the room after she placed them on the bed in front of the king. _

_ The king was initially delighted when he saw his two beautiful daughters, but that delight quickly turned to horror as they transformed in front of his eyes into terrifying beasts with the bodies of lions and wings with white feathers on their backs. _

_ The king loved his two daughters despite their horrific appearances and he claimed that they would become queens after he died. He claimed that his kingdom would be a kingdom where two creatures would live in harmony, the griffins and the humans. _

_ In the morning, the king demanded that every woman who could give birth enter his castle so that he could impregnate them. He told them of his terrible curse, he showed them his horrid children and he claimed that he wanted them to rule an entire kingdom of similar creatures when he died. Under threat of death, every woman in the kingdom agreed to carry a griffin in their wombs. _

_ Within a year, the kingdom was filled with griffins from the cursed seed of the king, and the forest was filled with dragons from the cursed womb of the princess. _

Wrroooaaah!

The horrible screeching sound penetrated the air and if I had ears I probably would have covered them. My grandfather winced in pain when he heard the loud shriek.

"Let the deity protect usss all," the ground shook but I wasn't afraid because I knew that my grandfather would protect me.

Waraaaaugh!

Another shriek was heard, the snakes in the pit were panicking and my grandfather was trying to hide his fear. He stared at the cave, bracing himself for what he feared the most, for what he had been seeking to avoid for his entire life. Xnoy, the dragon responsible for the end of the age of humans and the beginning of the age of dragons, the dragon responsible for the death of Zbis, the only creature that my grandfather feared, the dragon of death was about to be free.

Bwaoom!

Rocks flew through the air. The snakes all shouted in surprise and fear. Against my better judgement, I looked up to the sky and I saw the monster that had been responsible for so much death.

Xnoy, the massive dragon, was just as repulsive as a creature who had been living underground for centuries would be expected to look. Her skin had been decaying for many years and even though she was far above me in the sky I could see the bones in her legs.

Her body was covered with numerous dragons clinging to her body with their teeth, just like leeches did when they sucked blood, according to my father. Some of the dragons couldn't hold onto her and they fell from her body to their deaths.

As quickly as she appeared, she was gone. A single flap of her extremely large wings was enough to carry her far away from the pit of snakes. The eyes of my grandfather travelled around the area, searching for signs of damage and casualties. He sighed in relief, which was a good sign.

"Thank the deity, no one wasss hurt."

\---

She didn't love me. She'd never love me.

Saturn and Echo had been meeting at the bakery every week since that dragon showed up. It hurt my heart to see them talking like they were best friends when they first started meeting each other. But, I still had hope that maybe Saturn wasn't in love with Echo and maybe she could fall in love with me.

Then, they started to become a little bit more romantic with each other. It started off so simple, a peck on the cheek as they were leaving, the occasional blush, normal things. Then, they started holding claws and nuzzling each other tenderly.

The moment when I knew that they had fallen in love with each other was when Saturn arrived and asked me to bake a special cake for her.

"What kind of cake do you want me to bake?" She smiled at me and my heart stopped for a moment or two when I heard her say the words that I didn't want her to say.

"It's a wedding cake, young one, so it has to be special," a part of me still hoped that Saturn would propose to me at that moment and claim that the cake would be for our wedding. But, I knew that wasn't the case when I heard the doorbell ring and I watched Echo walk into the bakery with wedding dresses draped on her back.

They kissed in front of me, a real kiss. The dresses, the cake, the flowers that I had placed on the counter, it was all so romantic and I hated it. She didn't love me, she loved Echo and she wanted me to bake a cake for their wedding. She loved my cakes, but she never spared a thought for the griffin baking the cakes that she loved.

If only she could love me as much as she loved my cakes. That was the thinking that led me to where I was on that fateful morning, preparing a special cake with a special surprise for her.

The massive cake that I had baked for her wedding was hollowed out, so I had climbed inside and sealed the cake. She would have no idea that I was inside of her favorite dessert until she had sliced into my flesh, ending my life. I would die happy knowing that she had eaten just a small piece of my body so that a small piece of me could be a part of her.

She arrived to pick up the cake with Echo beside her. I could hear their voices, as well as the voices of a group of other griffins. I could make out pieces of their conversation as they picked up the cake and carried it out the door.

"Y-y-you said that his f-f-father is a snake, right? Is h-h-he scary?" Echo's voice made my blood boil, but I remained quiet. "He is a little scary, but don't worry little one, he won't hurt you," why would a giant snake be at a wedding?

I fell asleep quickly and I dreamed a wonderful dream where Saturn kissed me while Echo cried at the altar, abandoned. She felt as unloved as I felt every moment of my life.

I was awoken when a claw dug into my skin, and it took all of my self-control not to scream in pain. The claw took a fairly big chunk of my body, which would have been fine if it was Saturn's claw, but it wasn't. It was the claw of a dragon.

"Oi, Oryps! Ya wanna check this out, bud," a furry wing moved the cake surrounding my face and I could see where I was. I wasn't at the castle, I wasn't even in the clouds anymore, I was on the land.

I had heard stories about the land beneath the clouds, about the grass, the dirt and the animals. I heard that it was dangerous and that there was a reason why we stayed in the clouds. But, the brown dragon in front of me didn't look dangerous, he actually looked soft, sweet and cuddly wuddly.

"Oryps, buddy, what do ya think of this?" Thankfully, no one else had seen me, just the furry dragon and apparently his friend who he was shouting at.

"Ay ain't an expert on fruits, ya know, that's your thing. But, ay don't think that this is a fruit," the dragon stepped in front of me and I was shocked when I realized that I recognized the dragon, I had seen him before.

"You! You did this to me!" I lunged at the dragon and I started ruthlessly clawing at him. The dragon didn't seem bothered by it at all and that made me angry.

"Oryps, do ya need some help or what?" The purple dragon held up his claw. "I think sshe needss to lassh out. Don't worry, Ssheep, I can take it," I started drawing blood from him and he winced a little but he still didn't seem too bothered by my attacks.

"Why aren't you doing anything! You're bleeding, you should be crying or something!" I stopped attacking him for a moment, it just didn't feel good.

"Do you want me to cry? Would that make you feel better?" Would it have made me happy if he cried? Maybe if everyone who made fun of me in the clouds cried I would be happy, but that dragon seemed so nice. Would it make me feel better if he cried in front of me?

"I, I don't know," the dragon nodded his head. It felt like he could see something inside of me that I couldn't see and that he knew something about me that I would never know.

"What would make you happy?" No one had ever asked me that before. Not even Saturn had ever asked me what she could do to make me happy.

"I just want someone to love me," my eyes felt a little bit wet. "Griffins love cake, but they don't love me. I thought that if I was a cake I would be loved. But I guess no one wants a me-flavored cake," I sniffled. The dragon pitied me because I was so pathetic. The other creatures at the wedding apparently didn't notice me, or didn't care.

"Don't cry, cake griffin. Ay'm sure lots of snakes here would love a griffin-flavored cake. Do ya want me to find ya one?" The purple-scaled dragon glared at his friend.

"It was just a joke, bud," the dragon hastily said. "Ssure it was," the purple dragon rolled his eyes and he seemed irritated by his friend, but he had a good-natured smile on his face. I wished that I had a friendship like those two had. Actually, I just wished that I had a friend.

"You're looking a bit pale, we sshould probably do ssomething about that," his wing brushed against my wound and I winced in pain. "Ssaturn'ss the griffin expert here, but Telia hass a lot of healing experience. Not with griffinss, though," the brown-furred dragon chuckled.

"Bud, do ya really want ta bother Telia on her wedding day?" My eyes widened and my heart warmed up. That wasn't Saturn and Echo's wedding, it was Telia's wedding. The wedding dresses weren't for them, they were for Telia. I could still make Saturn love me.

"I want to see Saturn!" I didn't mean to shout, but I hadn't been happy for an entire day. The purple-scaled dragon smirked and I didn't like it. Was he going to make fun of me just like everyone else? He could have been my friend.

"That'ss good, becausse sshe'ss right behind you," I turned my head to see the love of my life standing behind me, the one griffin who had never laughed at me or mocked me.

I screamed, I cried and I knew that I would have nightmares later.

\---

"Ya traumatized that poor girl," the furry dragon could never understand why it was necessary to do what I did. I was so much older than any other griffin aside from my sister and sometimes the griffins who were in love with me needed to be reminded of that.

When my mother died, she offered me and my sister anything we desired. She was a human witch, the last human magic user to ever exist, and she could have given us anything we wanted. We were both so young, so stupid and so insecure.

I never felt like I was loved enough by the other griffins. I wished that every griffin would adore me and my sister wished that both of us would be able to live forever. My mother knew that we would regret our wishes, but she granted them anyway.

The problem was that every griffin loved me far too much. They would hold celebrations in my honor, they would camp out in the castle yard just to see me, they would shower me with gifts of food while they starved and they would murder every griffin I had ever chosen to love.

I envied my sister for not having to deal with the love of the griffins. If she wanted to, she could go for a quiet midday flight without being hassled by the lovestruck griffins, but I needed to lock myself in my room just to have some privacy.

"They all love me, every last one of them. The only thing that makes them stop is to see the real me," the brown furry dragon glared at me.

"Ay know that ain't the real you, and ya know it too," I scoffed. The furry creature had no idea who the real me was.

"Ay'm serious. Ay may be a fool, but Oryps ain't. He told me about ya, he told me about the gold ya got up there and where ya got it from. Ya killed all those poor humans, right?" How could he possibly think that I could be a good griffin after what I had done? I murdered those poor creatures who just wanted to escape the terrifying things in their world and start a new life somewhere else.

"Oi, listen! Ay know ya probably think ya did the wrong thing and maybe you're right. But, ya know what, the humans fucked up this world and they would have fucked up your world if ya gave them the chance. They were better off dead," he paused and looked directly into my eyes as though he was trying to see something that no one but him could see, maybe my soul, maybe something else.

"Even if I did the right thing, I only did it because something evil made me do it, a demon. How can I be good if there's always something evil inside of me?" The furry dragon laughed as though I had just told him a funny joke.

"Ya know Oryps," I nodded my head. "Yeah, stupid question. Ya came all the way here for his wedding. He's done some terrible things and so have ay. But, ay still love him 'cause he's like my family, ya know what ay mean?" I nodded my head, but that only made him shake his head sadly, as though he was disappointed in the answer he received.

"Ya don't get it, it doesn't matter if there is something evil inside ya because there's evil in all of us. We're all shit and that's fine. What matters is that ya never stop fighting that evil thing inside of ya," I frowned. I stopped fighting once before, when I became that evil monster that slaughtered the humans when they arrived. The griffins stopped loving me when they saw the monster that I truly was.

"Ya know, ay think that everyone hates their family at some point. Your mother, your father, your sisters and brothers are the first ones who ya'll realize are shit. Ya'll hate them because, at that point, ya'll still think that some creatures in the world ain't shit. But some day, when you start ta get ta know someone who ain't your family, ya'll realize that everyone is shit. Then, you'll love your family because ya'll realize that they're shit just like everyone else, but at least they love ya and will keep loving ya until ya die. Ya get what ay'm saying?" He shook his head and rubbed his horns.

"Nah, ya know what, forget everything ay told you. Ay don't know what ay'm even saying now," the furry dragon shook his head, then he literally turned his back on me and started to walk away.

"Ah, forget it. Ya can talk ta Oryps about your issues," I felt the talon of a dragon tap my shoulder and I didn't need to turn around to know who it was.

"How is she?" The dragon walked in front of me and stared at me with a stern expression. He wanted me to feel bad, and I did, but I didn't plan on showing him how bad I felt. I knew that I had done the right thing.

"Sshe'ss going to kill hersself. Maybe tonight, maybe tomorrow, maybe sshe'll wait a few monthss or yearss, but sshe'ss gonna do it. You're going to have to live with that," I nodded my head.

"I don't think you undersstand. Thiss iss a trauma for her, and sshe'ss not gonna recover from it. Sshe ssaid sshe doessn't have a family and sshe doessn't have friendss," I nodded my head again. I knew how much damage I had done to that poor girl, but it was the best thing for her. A monster like me shouldn't love or be loved by anyone.

"I'm going to tell Echo that I can't see her again," the dragon didn't react. He expected me to say that, he had to know why I was making my decision. "I can't have what happened to that girl happen to Echo."

A moment of silence passed. The eyes of the dragon were pointed like a claw and his stare burned like a fire. I knew what he was capable of and he knew what I was capable of. We both could kill each other and that thought excited me. I wanted to die and the dragon could kill me.

"Sshe'ss going to assk you what happened and you need to tell her," of course Echo would ask what happened. She was sweet and she cared about strangers in a way that I struggled with.

"I'll tell her after the wedding," he smirked at me. I could see some of his venom dripping from his teeth onto his lower lip. When he turned to the side and spat the venom onto the ground, I found myself wishing that he would have given it to me instead.

"Which wedding? Mine or yourss?" I was not planning on marrying Echo and even if I was I knew that she wouldn't want to marry me when she saw what I had to show that poor girl.

"We both know that I won't get married," he smirked again as though he didn't believe me.

\---

"Echo, we need to talk," the wedding was over and I was sure that Echo enjoyed watching my friend get married to a unicorn he didn't love. I knew that he didn't care much about getting attached to the unicorn because, although I knew little about dragons, I knew that they didn't have weddings. He didn't view Telia as his wife because dragons didn't have wives, they had mates. To him, having a wife wasn't a big deal.

The only reason why it mattered to him was because it mattered to Telia. The unicorn cared about him, she loved him and for some reason she wanted to be his bride. Something hurt her, something made her feel like she had to manipulate a dragon into marrying her.

I never wanted Echo to be hurt by me, I was a monster and I always would be. I slaughtered the humans and I terrorized the griffins for many years when I gave up fighting the evil within me. My sister needed to banish me, but she never did. She never gave up on me and for nearly a century she helped me find the strength within myself to push away the evil deep within my soul.

I returned to normal, but I still felt the evil thing within me that just wanted to murder every single griffin who continued to adore me because of my selfish wish.

"Oh yes, we do! I was going to wait until later to tell you this, but we're together now and talking, and we both feel the same way. At least, I assume we do, if you don't then that's fine, but-"

"-Echo," I interrupted her and she blushed. A wing covered her face in a way that I thought was absolutely adorable. Why was she making it so hard for me to push her away by making me want to hold her close to me and never let go?

"Echo, I can't see you anymore. It's for the best," time slowed down just for me so that I could feel even worse about what I knew was the right thing to do. She looked up at me with sad eyes, her lips trembled and her eyes started to water. She whimpered and I knew it sounded absurd, but it was the most melancholy sound I had ever heard.

"Sheep said that you might break up with me, but I thought he was lying," it would have been a lot easier if she hadn't believed that we had been dating.

"Echo, we were never courting each other, you were never my suitor. We were just good friends," the little griffin looked like her heart had been shattered into a million little pieces.

"We w-w-weren't dating?" I shook my head. "But, we ate cake together and we kissed and we had sex!"

"We never had sex," she blushed and looked down at the ground. "I guess that was a dream, but I think that the cake and kiss happened," she was right. I had kissed her and I had eaten cake with her numerous times. I loved her, but I knew that she could never love me if she knew what a monster I truly was.

"Why can't we just be friends?" She was still looking away from my face. I could show her what I truly was, I could show her what I showed that unfortunate griffin. I could make sure that she would never love me again.

_ I needed to make sure that she would never love me again. It was for her own good. _

"Echo, you can look up now," she looked up slowly, as if she knew that she wouldn't like what she would see. She looked into my eyes, she looked at the face of the most terrifying monster that had ever existed in the clouds.

"Y-Y-You, y-y-you..." She stammered like so many others had done, but she hadn't fainted or ran away yet. That was a better reaction than most griffins had when they saw my true form.

She inhaled, then she exhaled slowly. Then, she did something truly surprising, something that no one else had ever done. She reached out and gently stroked my claw. She refused to look away from me and I could see the love she still felt for me inside of her eyes.

"You're still beautiful," I was speechless. She had seen my true form and she still thought that I was beautiful.

"I'm not beautiful!" I needed to convince her that she shouldn't love me, she needed to be as far away from me as possible. "I killed the humans all those years ago! The gold necklace that you wear around your neck, the gold armor that my guards wear, this gold crown, they're all stained with innocent blood! I'm a monster!" Echo never stopped stroking me, she patiently listened to my yelling in a way that only my sister had ever done.

"Sheep told me what you did," her whispered voice was all that I was focused on, the other sounds around me might as well have not existed. "He also told me what the humans had done to this world. They enslaved dragons, they angered the deity and the world they left behind is horrible. Sheep lives in a tree, Oryps lives in a cave and Telia's brother is a crazed murderer," her claw quickly covered her mouth. "I'm sorry, Telia told me not to tell anyone that. I hope that she can forgive me."

"We don't know that they would have destroyed our world," she sadly nodded her head. "You're right, we don't know what they would have done. Every life is beautiful, and you know that better than anyone. You've kept me and my family safe for my entire life, you gave me a reason to smile every day and you've mourned the humans every day since their deaths," her claw brushed softly against my cheek.

"That's why you are beautiful. It doesn't matter what you did or who you were, all that matters is what you are doing now and who you are now," no, she was wrong. The humans were all dead because of me, that was what mattered. The little griffin who hid in the cake was traumatized because of me, that was what mattered. It didn't matter that I had become a kinder griffin. I didn't deserve redemption after all of the things that I had done.

"Please, don't push me away. Let me show you how beautiful you are."


End file.
